Walk through the rice fields near Hwasun and you can lose count of the dolmens. Nearly six hundred of them lie scattered across the slopes at Hyosan-ri and Daesin-ri in South Jeolla, the biggest concentration in a trio of Korean sites that were listed as a World Heritage landmark in 2000. They are huge flat capstones balanced on smaller upright stones, some of them over a hundred tonnes, built roughly three thousand years ago in the Bronze Age by a society that left no written word. Korea has more dolmens than anywhere else in the world, perhaps around forty percent of all that exist, and this valley is where you feel it.
What makes Hwasun special is that you can see the quarry. A mountainside behind the site still holds the rock from which the capstones were split, and the cutting marks tell you how people did it, with wedges and water and fire. The dolmens sit along a stream, and a path winds between them. Some are table-shaped and some squat like boulders; you will find a few lying half in the grass, as if resting.
The area is farmland, and the setting is gentle. The nearest town, Hwasun, is a place of about sixty thousand people with petrol stations and restaurants, and the city of Gwangju is not far away if you need serious supplies. The riding in this part of Korea tends to be rural and calm, along narrow roads between paddy fields with mountains in the distance. Mudeungsan, the big granite massif by Gwangju, is a short ride away, with winding roads and a national park. Unjusa temple near Hwasun is known for its legend of a thousand stone Buddhas and pagodas, and there are impressive red sandstone cliffs by the reservoir.
Expect speed cameras, which are common and strictly enforced, and little English signage away from the main roads. Spring brings the cherry and plum blossoms, and in October the rice turns gold around the stones, which makes the best photographs. Summers are hot and humid with heavy monsoon rain in July.
This is the sort of place where an hour feels like a century, and that is exactly how the builders would have wanted it.