North Korea has been a quiet, keep-to-yourself country for decades. There are stories you’ll read on the internet about people visiting North Korea, usually in the demilitarized zone, the 148-mile-long strip that incorporates territory from both North and South Korea, as part of their quest to visit every country in the world. Or when Facebook executive Eric Tseng did a video tour of the Koryo Hotel, located in Pyongyang, during his visit to the country in 2015.
Don’t get me wrong – thousands of people DID go there yearly for leisure travel, but they were mainly Chinese citizens.
However even those small chances to visit what may be considered one of the world’s most mysterious countries (at least to outsiders, and especially to Americans) slammed to a halt when the Covid-19 pandemic hit in 2020. To this day, North Korea has remained closed to virtually all outsiders.
However, UK-based Metro reports that Kim Jong-un has ordered construction be resumed on the Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Tourist Zone. The plan is that when (if?) finished, the final product will be similar to Benidorm (a popular tourist destination in Spain, chock full of beaches, skyscrapers and hotels. It’s particularly popular with Brits).
The Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Tourist Zone project was initially planned to be completed by mid-2019 and then mid-2020. Tourists would have access to water parks, hotels and an airfield near Wonson, a port city on North Korea’s eastern coast. But, of course, the pandemic halted construction.
Metro, as well as North Korea newspaper Daily NK both reported earlier this year that the construction site was in something of a shambles. It was inhabited by the homeless, covered in human waste and soot from fires. Windows were broken out of buildings. So, after nearly 4 years of neglect, it sounds like they’d have to do quite a bit of cleanup before construction could resume. But Kim apparently has big plans for the site.
The eventual goal is for the Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Tourist Zone to be a tourist destination for foreign travelers. Of course, both the United States and Canada have high-level warnings about traveling to North Korea:
- U.S.: Do not travel to North Korea due to the continuing serious risk of arrest and long-term detention of U.S. nationals. Exercise increased caution to North Korea due to the critical threat of wrongful detention.
- All U.S. passports are invalid for travel to, in, or through the DPRK unless specially validated for such travel under the authority of the Secretary of State.
- Special validations are granted only in very limited circumstances.
- Canada: Avoid all travel to North Korea due to the uncertain security situation caused by its nuclear weapons development program and highly repressive regime.
But that’s OK because North Korea’s goals appear to be for visitors from “not North America.” More likely, European countries. Unfortunately for them, the UK requests its residents to avoid travel to North Korea, as do the governments of Ireland, Australia, and many others.
Construction on Wonsan-Kalma Coastal Tourist Zone is currently set to begin (not end….begin) in 2025.
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