Samcheunpo (now part of Sacheon City) is a small port town on the southern coast of South Korea, tucked between high rocky cliffs. Its residents used to boast of living in "the smallest city in Korea" — the city with the bare minimum population to qualify as such.
Small public beaches are nestled between the cliffs along the coast. The water is warm in summer, though the inlets are shallow and you may need to wade out quite a way. The real draw for visitors is the Sangjokam dinosaur footprints, where genuine fossilized tracks are embedded in the shoreline rocks — both the clawed prints of predators and the round, heavy prints of herbivores. A boardwalk wraps around the cliffs, and the site draws families for swimming, picnicking, and fossil-spotting. Inland, the Bronze Age Igeum-dong archaeological site preserves dolmens and reconstructed pit houses, and the five-span Samcheonpo Bridge west of town is a destination in itself.
The town has good seafood restaurants serving the day's catch, and a handful of inexpensive, comfortable places to stay.