One subway line, end to end: a day in Busan from temple to tideline

Busan's Line 1 runs from a mountain temple to a tidal flat in a little over an hour. Most visitors ride three or four stops of it and call that Busan. Taken end to end, on purpose, with the stops chosen for what is at street level, it is the best day the city gives you without a car.

Start at the mountain end

Ride north to Beomeosa Station first, before the heat. City bus 90 climbs the shoulder of Geumjeongsan (금정산) to Beomeosa (범어사), a seventh-century temple that is still a working one — monks crossing the courtyard, laundry out, the kitchen going. Walk up past the main hall until the buildings run out and the forest takes over. Ninety minutes is enough.

The middle is where you eat

Dongnae, a few stops down, makes pajeon (파전) that is a different dish from the thin scallion pancake elsewhere: thick with whole spring onions and shellfish, cut with scissors. Further south at Jagalchi (자갈치), the second-floor rooms will cook whatever you point at in the tanks downstairs. One stop on at Nampo, walk uphill into Bosu-dong Book Street (보수동 책방골목), an alley of secondhand shops stacked to the ceiling.

The line is the itinerary. The only decision left is where you get off.

Finish where the track stops

The southern terminus is Dadaepo Beach (다대포해수욕장), at the mouth of the Nakdong River, and it is why the day runs in this direction. The water stays shallow far out, so at low tide the sand turns to a mirror people cross barefoot. The fountain plaza above the beach runs evening programmes in the warm months on a posted schedule; in winter there is wind and the sunset, which is enough.

부산 지하철 1호선은 산속 절에서 시작해 바다에서 끝납니다.

Buy the one-day pass at the ticket machine instead of tapping single fares, and check the last train before you settle in for the light.