Geotourism: Jejugeo Park, Korea
Have
you ever heard about the word “Geotourism?” I guess many people are not
familiar with this word, in fact I had recently found out what geotourism is. According to the Wikipedia, the most widely
known definition of Geotourism is “purely geological and geomorphologically –focused
sustainable tourism as abiotic nature based tourism.” (Wikipedia) Basically, it means that it is a tourism
that sustains the exact geographical features of a place and these include the
environment, heritage, culture and the living lives of local people etc. Nowadays, there are many Geotourism in
worldwide and people could closely enjoy the nature and also get chances to
learn more about the unfamiliar characters in rural areas. In Korea, there is also a famous Geotourism
area in Jeju island. It’s called JeJugeo Park(제주지질공원) and
this place is well known as one of the famous geological park selected by
UNESCO in 2010. Because there are many beautiful and natural attractions in Jejugeo Park, many tourists visit the area and this influence shows some postive effects of Geotourism, which are maintaining the local community from the tourism profits, and tourists getting chance of learning and respecting the protected areas.
Photo of UNESCO mark
One of the possible effects of Jejugeo Park
is supporting the local community. To be specific, money that tourists spend in
tourism, local foods, entertainments etc. helps the living of local community. In
JeJugeopark, there are many diverse activities provided that tourists can enjoy. For
example, there is a baking class and the class teaches children how to bake a “stratum
cake.” This cake is shaped as stratum and this resembles one of the famous
stratum attraction in Jejugeo Park. Furthermore, there are other activities
such as cooking a local food, visiting local farm and plant organic vegetables
and taking a “Geo railroad.” By providing these diverse and interesting activities,
tourists get attention and it naturally leads to benefits for local residents.
Photo of Stratum cake, local food
Other possible effect is that tourists get
chances to learn about the local culture and also respect the natural belongings. JeJugeo was selected as the cleanest island in UNESCO. Therefore, it
has become important to sustain the natural belongings, such as mountains and
beach attractions, to keep the island as a beautiful place. To protect the environment
in Jejugeo Park, the local communities continuously spend efforts teaching the
tourists the importance of Jejugeo Park’s existence through the tour guide or
education. Because of these effective actions, tourists can easily understand
it’s local culture and also fascinates at the nature beauty of JeJu Island.
Photo of Stratum attraction in JeJugeo island
Overall, there are two postive effects of
Geotourism in JeJugeo Park. First, Geotourism in JeJuGeo Park can lead many
people’s attentions and naturally this brings profits to local community. In
addition, tourists understanding the JeJu local community culture and noticing
the importance of nature are positive ways to protect the area of JeJu island,
which is one of the most clean island in the world. As we could see, sustaining endangered areas by holding geotourism shows several benefits to both community and tourists. Hence, the rise of geotourism may be a practical solution to keep our traditional cultures and culture relics to the public.
