Bugok Hot Spring

This hot spring was named as 'Bugok' as this area shapes like a big iron pot. Dongguk Yeoji Seungram has a record that there is a hot spring here, so it was also called 'Onjeong' meaning 'a warm well'. Mt. Deokamsan, the mountain behind Bugok is a dead vocano. The old book, Taekniji, also has a record about Bugok saying 'The mountain is graceful as it is made of graceful stones. The water is clean.' Deokamsan and Onjeong-cheon equippedall conditions written is Taekniji. The fact that there was a volcano explains that there can be a hot spring.
The owner of Bugok Hot Spring Sin Hyeon Taek first found the sulfur spring of 78°C water(6,000 tons of water a day) hot enough to boil eggs. The water contains about 20 kinds of minerals including Silicon, Chlorine, calcium, iron as well as sulfur. The water has efficacy to cure the breath disease, neuralgia, Rheumatism, skin diseases, Chilblain, bruise, prickly heat and chill disease. It is equipped with Korea's biggest public bath, a large performance hall, indoor and outdoor swimming pools, a zoo and a botanical garden.
Bugok Hot Spring was designated as a national tour resort in 1977 and as a special district on January 18, 1997 by the Ministry of Culture and Tourism. It is now known as the best sulfur hot spring in Korea proving efficacy for all diseases. Hundreds of thousands of patients came in crowds to cure their diseases.
As they were bothered too much, the villagers put dogs in the spring, planted lacquer trees nearby, changed the cillage name into Geomun-ri and closed the hot spring. It is said that the patients in those, dogs enjoyed 'Gakseori‘, so in Bugok Hot Spring Festival (September each year) they hold Gakseori competition as a tourism event.
In Bugok Tourism Speci Special Tourism District there are 5 tourist hotels, 23 accommodations, 21 shops as well as Bugok Hawaii equipped with a big public bath, a big hot spring, a large performance hall, indoor and outdoor swimming pool, and a botanical garden. These are footprints of herbivorous and carnivorous dinosaurs at the entrance of Ilseong Condominium. In 1991 Bugok Golf course was opened to acivate sports to induce more tourists to the hot spring. This 18 hole golf course has annual 85,000 visitors.