My trip to North Koreas Benidorm

It was the security guards accompanying Anastasia Samsonova’s group that advised this wasn’t a typical seaside vacation.

In July, the 33-year-old human sources employee was one of the first vacationers to keep at a new vacation resort in North Korea, a nation largely closed to the surface world.

Set in an exclusive space on the east coast where chief Kim Jong Un spent a lot of his youth, the Wonsan Kalma Coastal Tourist Zone opened on 1 July.

Built close to a missile testing web site, the resort options motels, eating places, purchasing malls and a water park, according to state media.

But while it was initially billed as being open to worldwide vacationers, so far only Russians, coming into in teams and organised by accredited journey businesses, have been allowed in.

Anastasia travelled there last month with 14 other people. The go to was tightly managed, with guides and guards accompanying them and a fixed itinerary that couldn’t be diverged from without permission from North Korean authorities.

She says the guides told her the guards have been needed to “prevent situations where we interacted with locals and startled them”.

“When we walked down the street, they [North Koreans] looked at us with great surprise because the country has been closed for a very long time,” says Anastasia.

BBC News Russian acquired in contact with her after looking the geotags of people on social media who had travelled to the resort, independently of any journey company or media outlet.

No scramble for sunloungers

Anastasia says her group was also told not to {photograph} construction websites and was anticipated not to put on revealing garments.

Yet despite the restrictions, she says she “enjoyed a vacation without people” on almost-empty seashores with white sand.

“Every day the [beach] was cleaned and levelled perfectly. Everything was immaculate,” she says.

“The loungers were absolutely new, everything spotless. The entrance to the sea was very gentle, so yes, it really was a very good beach.”

Since the Covid pandemic, worldwide tourism into North Korea had been on pause to forestall the unfold of the virus.

But last 12 months, the republic started permitting Russian vacationers to go to again.

In February, it also began receiving vacationers from the West, including Australia, France, Germany and the UK, though it abruptly halted this weeks later, without saying why.

Wonsan Kalma has been touted as a key half of Kim’s ambitions to enhance tourism in the nation.

It is said to have drawn inspiration from Spain’s tourism hotspot Benidorm, where a North Korean delegation was despatched on a fact-finding mission in 2017.

But particulars of how it was constructed have been shrouded in secrecy, and human rights teams have criticised the alleged harsh treatment of staff.

Weeks after it opened, North Korea announced that foreigners have been “temporarily” not allowed to go to – besides vacationers from Russia, an ally of the republic.

So far, two Russian tour teams have visited the resort, with another at present there.

Every week-long trip from Russia to North Korea, including three days at the Wonsan Kalma resort, prices $1,800 (£1,300) – 60% more than the average month-to-month wage in Russia.

Some adverts for the trip even reference the close by missile testing web site, describing it as a “unique” trip spot.

Anastasia says no missiles have been launched while she was there, but toy rockets have been being offered close by for $40 (£30).

Describing a typical day while on her trip, Anastasia says the group would have breakfast at 08:00 when heaps of actions have been deliberate and 09:30 on a more relaxed day.

In phrases of the food they got, there was “lots of meat”, sometimes in candy and bitter sauce, and a dish involving finely-chopped cabbage and carrots in sauce.

She says a 500ml bottle of beer was very low cost, costing about 60 cents at the seaside, while the memento of selection for vacationers was North Korean Olympic clothes.

Another vacationer, Daria, writing on Instagram, described the resort as “very raw” and “not the kind of vacation Russian tourists are used to”.

“But if you’re tired of Asia, Turkey, etc., and want something exotic — this is it,” she added.

However, there may be uncertainty over when the next Russian vacationers can be allowed into Wonsan Kalma.

The journey company which organised the first three journeys to the resort, Vostok Intur, said there was high curiosity in potential tours in September, but North Korean authorities had yet to agree to them.

Initially, tours have been marketed online by Russian journey businesses for mid-September, but these have been later eliminated.

It shouldn’t be just Russians who face difficulties getting to Wonsan Kalma.

Even residents of China, which borders North Korea and is its main ally and financial accomplice, are having difficulties accessing the resort, according to Andrei Lankov, an professional in North Korea-Russia relations and a professor at Kookmin University in Seoul.

He says Pyongyang intentionally limits the quantity of vacationers and carefully controls their actions, in half so North Koreans will not examine themselves unfavourably to richer foreigners.

“Ordinary people might begin to wonder, ‘How is it that even without our great leader, or his son or daughter, they seem to live so well?'”, Lankov says.

For that cause, North Korea has concluded it is largely better not to have too many foreigners coming into the nation, he provides.

With journey restrictions into North Korea easing, tourism from Russia has been rising, though it stays modest in contrast with other locations.

In 2024, about 1,500 Russians travelled to North Korea for tourism, according to Russia’s Federal Security Service border guards.

In distinction, more than 6.7 million visited Turkey and nearly 1.9 million went to China.

However, in the second quarter of 2025, 1,673 Russians entered North Korea as vacationers – a stage last seen in 2010, before vacationer restrictions have been launched.

Wonsan Kalma is seen as key to reviving North Korea’s ailing financial fortunes, but it isn’t been without controversy.

Since the resort started construction in 2018, human rights teams have protested the alleged mistreatment of its staff. They level to stories of people being compelled to work long hours to end the huge project under harsh situations and insufficient compensation.

The BBC has approached the North Korean embassy in London for remark.

Despite the challenges of getting to Wonsan Kalma, and the restrictions on what Russian vacationers can do when they arrive in North Korea, Anastasia says she hopes to come back next 12 months.

“We’re actually thinking about gathering the whole group next year to go to the same place.

“I’m not sure if it’ll work out, but I’ve heard there’s also a ski resort close to Wonsan Kalma. So, perhaps in the future I’ll go to that resort too.”