Eulsukdo Park

This guide to Eulsukdo Park in Busan starts with a blunt sign at the marsh's edge, admitting the birds that once filled these mudflats had all but vanished. It traces how the Nakdong River's rich delta fed clams and fish for generations, until Busan spent the nineteen nineties burying its own garbage in the wetland. Whooper swans still fly in from Siberia and China every winter, landing here starved after thousands of kilometers in the air, needing to eat the moment they touch down. Stand at the boardwalk and watch them feed in the shallows just beyond it.