Super fun and nice being in the... - <p>Super fun and nice being in the mountains. Great views. Jay our guide was fabulous. Not for those with knee issues or those with health and fitness challenges as some parts of the climb are taxing. Good hiking shoes and poles recommended.</p>

Self-guided would be safer - Kyung ae was very helpful in planning the two trips my sister and I took with TAGY: 1-day KTX trip to Jeonju and a 2-day KTX to the Southwest region. It seemed pricey but the idea of not having to worry about anything was attractive. We were given Mr. Jay as the guide for both. The 1-day trip to Jeonju went well enough. We had a nice lady pick us up from out accommodations and we were accompanied to and from the train in both locations without issue. We had a peasant walk to Maisan Tapsa temple and spent a nice chunk of the day exploring Jeonju - the hanok village was pretty touristy, but picturesque, the bibimbap lunch tasty, the mural village very hilly but pretty. Mr. Jay was not super communicative and would sometimes go very quickly ahead of us, but it did not stop us enjoying the trip. The issue started at the start of the second trip. We chose to have a short hike in Wolchulsan and visit the Boseong Tea Fields on the first day. Mr. Jay decided that were were fit enough to do a 5 hour intense hike instead because I guess he assumed we were young enough. First we went the wrong way (should have tipped us off) and spent 30 minutes going up and down a dead-end trail. And despite letting him know that we were both previously injured and my sister slipping and twisting her ankle in the first 30 minutes of the hike, Mr. Jay was insistent on continuing. He provided me with a knee compression sleeve and a tie for "old people" to put up above my injured knee. After my sister's slip and fall he decided to go in front of us and would frequently go out of sight. My sister did not want to end up left behind and we were not sure if it was possible to return the same way as it had been slippery and difficult on the way up. When we would catch up to him, he assured us it would be better to go the whole way and there would be stone stairs on the way down instead of slippery rock. I slipped as well but did not twist anything, thankfully. Mr. Jay was too far ahead to do anything but watch to see if I got up again. And then we got lost. With a guide. We ended up taking a wrong fork after he had spoken about a suspension bridge and ended up on a 700m detour going up and down with extreme incline. I had to WhatsApp him to find out where he was after we made it to another forked path and we did not see him. As I was trying to figure out where we were and where he was he laughed about it. I was ready to sit down and not move off that mountain. After an hour, he finally "found" us and then promptly started disappearing ahead of us again. Lesson not learned. Once we got to the hotel, my sister was limping and we asked him to get us ice from the concierge who only spoke Korea. The fancy hotel apparently did not have any on offer and we were told to go to a convenience store to get it. After we looked distressed about it, he ended up going to get the ice himself. I had to also ask for an earlier start time because I did not think we could get through our itinerary with our injured legs. I wrote to the company about the issue and they agreed with me that we should not have done the hike if we did not want to and we should not have gotten lost with a guide. They offered to have my sister taken to a hospital/clinic and to refund for whatever we would miss. I agreed. We spent over an hour at the clinic and my sister was given a brace and told to only walk on flat surfaces for at least 4 weeks and given a diagnosis of fluid in the knee and an ankle sprain. Mr. Jay did pay for the visit, but that was the least that could be done. We did not do two of the itinerary items and only ended up at Boseong tea field because I insisted on going. He would still run ahead of us. Memorably, I let him know I'm going to the bathroom and found him gone when I exited. We spent the rest of our stay in South Korea minimizing inclines and had to cut some of our plans for the other day trips we had planned. We are now both in pain and using knee braces on and off. I have not heard back from the company at all since May 7th. Would not recommend, especially for any hiking.