Busan 2019: Busan Tower (부산타워)

After finishing up at Haedong Yonggungsa Temple I took a long ride by bus and metro across the city to reach Busan Tower. This 120-meter (394-foot) tall tower is located near Busan’s port and was built in 1973. Unlike Namsan Seoul Tower and many other towers in Korea, Busan Tower doesn’t serve any function for broadcasting TV or radio signals and exists purely as an observation deck and cafe. In 2017 I ran out of time to visit Busan Tower but in 2019 I was able to go inside and take the elevator up to the observation deck. Entry to Busan Tower is current 8,000 won (roughly USD $7.27).

Busan Tower offers a good view of the harbor area of Busan, but more distant parts of the city are hard to see, partly because of the mountainous terrain and partly because of how spread out Busan is. You can see the upper parts of the towers of Haeundae in the east but the eastern part of Busan is largely out of view, along with most of northern Busan. Even with those limitations, however, you can still see a lot of the city from Busan Tower and if you enjoy visiting observation decks (and if the weather is good) I’d say it’s worth the entry fee. The area around the base of the tower is also pretty nice and has a little bell pavilion and some other stuff to see before or after going up the tower.