Last Saturday, I went on tour of the Demilitarized Zone and it was awesome! If you ever have the chance to go to Korea, I'd definitely recommend the USO DMZ tour. You get to see all the "important" sites all for around $80, and you are protected by both ROK and US soldiers the entire time. We even got to technically step into North Korea! Photos were prohibited in many areas that we visited, but here are some pictures from those areas where photography was allowed.
Entering the Conference Room at the Joint Security Area, the only part of the North-South Korean border where soldiers from both sides stand face-to-face. These ROK soldiers who work at the JSA are required to excel in at least two forms of martial arts.
Inside the Conference Room. The people on the right side of the table are technically in North Korea, while the people on the left are in South Korea.
The Joint Security Area. The blue buildings all belong to South Korea, and the gray belong to North Korea. The concrete building in the background is Panmungok, North Korea's main building at the JSA.
At the top of the steps is a North Korean soldier looking towards the South with binoculars.
It was pretty foggy this day, but this is Kijongdong, North Korea's Propaganda Village! I was most excited during this part of the tour. A majority of the buildings in Propaganda Village are just concrete skeletons with painted-on doors and windows and no actual floors or rooms. The village is wired with electricity to make it look like it's inhabited, and loudspeakers play anti-Western propaganda 20 hours per day. On the flagpole in the middle hangs the biggest flag in the world, weighing in at 600 lbs. I say the flag "hangs" rather than flies because it's too heavy to actually be stirred by the wind--it takes abnormally strong winds to move the flag.
Another shot of Propaganda Village.
The area next to the blue pavilion is the point of the 1976 axe murder. (link)
A reenactment, in miniature, of the axe murder.
The Bridge of No Return (link)
Our tour guide of the JSA.
Dorasan Station, the northernmost train station in South Korea. Though trains cannot actually go to Pyeongyang, the sign says "Pyeongyang <----> Seoul" to express South Korea's hope of one day reuniting with North Korea, making train travel between the two capital cities possible.
