Yangyang riverside café with a jazz boat playlist: Cafe Dunchi

Today we came to Cafe Dunchi, a large café in Yangyang where you can try an electric boat ride. Let's get right into the review!!

Cafe Dunchi is a large Yangyang café operated together with a water leisure center that floats right on the Namdaecheon riverside.

Cafe Dunchi

How to get to Cafe Dunchi, and where to park and find a restroom

Cafe Dunchi sits on the Namdaecheon river, about 15 minutes by car from Hajodae Beach, where we were staying. Namdaecheon meets the sea and is famous as a water sports hotspot, and Cafe Dunchi is built right on top of it.

Since Cafe Dunchi is out on the water, you have to walk down to the riverside — there's a restroom near the entrance, so I'd recommend stopping there first, since there's no restroom inside the café.

Behind the restroom there's a path that connects to the front of the café, so don't panic — just keep walking through the path behind the restroom. There's also plenty of parking space in front of the café.

There's a magnificent old zelkova tree at the entrance of Cafe Dunchi in Yangyang.

Mom and my little sibling each got a photo-of-a-lifetime shot too! Lots of clouds but no rain, so there was little glare — genuinely perfect autumn-picnic weather.

Since Cafe Dunchi is on the water, you get there by crossing this bridge.

The café is on the 2nd floor, so up the stairs we go! Our youngest was all smiles arriving at the café — haha!

There are signs posted in several places noting there's no restroom inside the café, just so you know.

What's on each floor: café upstairs, boat rentals downstairs

The Namdaecheon view right before entering the café is truly a work of art. The 1st floor is the water leisure center where you can try the boats — cute round electric boats were waiting there.

Customers kept coming in for the café's river-view terrace seats too — they're gorgeous. Mom and the little one grabbed a terrace seat for a bit!

Order drinks before the boat: takeaway cups are allowed on board

Since the electric boat was our main goal today, we decided to order drinks first. It was great that Cafe Dunchi lets you bring drinks along on the boat ride!

The café menu is classic and simple! We ordered one drink per person — 2 iced americanos, a lemonade, and an iced chamomile tea — then headed off to ride the boat.

True to its status as a big Yangyang café, there's a variety of desserts, baked goods, and souvenir-style snacks made with local specialties too.

They hand you a buzzer when you order — it didn't take as long as I expected, haha.

Even inside the café, there's a window with a Namdaecheon view like a painting! Every corner of Cafe Dunchi's interior in Yangyang is picture-perfect.

Since we told them we were heading off to the boat ride, they prepared our drinks to go! The drink sizes were generously big too, which was nice.

Wow, the coffee was nutty and delicious! The lemonade tasted like it was made with handmade syrup — really thick and tangy, so just mix it well before drinking, haha.

How much is the electric boat at Cafe Dunchi, and how do you board?

With drinks in hand, off to the 1st floor for the boat! You go in through the office area inside.

Cafe Dunchi's boats are electric, so it's not the pedal-powered swan boat kind of workout — you cruise comfortably by motor. There are boats that seat up to 6 people. Since we were 4, we picked the 4-person boat! It's ₩30,000 for 30 minutes, so coming with a full group is the best value!

After paying, you pick a life jacket in your size, put it on, and head to the dock.

You board following the staff's instructions. The round, cute little electric boats!

When boarding with the max number of people, staff will guide you to seats balanced by weight — good to know! This photo was taken by my sister, who boarded last. The boat can rock a bit when the last person boards, so don't be startled — board slowly, haha.

Inside the electric boat there's a steering handle, a motor power button, and forward/reverse buttons — reverse is risky so we only used forward! They start a 30-minute timer for you and keep track.

There's a table in the middle of the boat with a drink holder — so convenient! We placed the timer there too, where it's easy to see.

30 minutes on the Namdaecheon: the route and what to watch out for

The view from the boat out on Namdaecheon! With a cool riverside breeze and nice weather, we felt amazing. Just a note — the boats can only operate within the area marked by the blue buoys.

My sister caught this cool captain shot of me, haha — Yangyang really lets you take unique photos. Oh, and we'd turned the motor off for a bit to take photos, but the wind was strong that day and the boat quickly drifted toward the buoy, so we got startled, turned the power back on, and got out of there, haha. You never know which way the current will push you — stay alert!

Playing a jazz playlist through the boat's Bluetooth speaker

Cafe Dunchi's electric boats have a built-in Bluetooth speaker, so you can connect your phone and play music while you ride.

My sister played a famous jazz playlist and it was peak romance!! I'd highly, highly recommend listening to jazz during the boat ride — we all took photos of each other one after another too.

The photo spot on the walking path behind Cafe Dunchi

After 30 romantic minutes, we got off the boat, and since the walking path around Namdaecheon looked so lovely, we decided to take a loop around it too.

Looking back from the walking path, the real back view of Cafe Dunchi in Yangyang was just gorgeous, haha.

Taking photos here made me feel like I'd landed somewhere in Europe, like Switzerland, haha. Definitely make your way up to the back path and take plenty of photos of a lifetime!!

You can see the full scene of Cafe Dunchi and our boat ride — the perfect ending to our family trip to Yangyang — in video too.

If you're looking for a big café with fun things to do in Yangyang, why not visit Cafe Dunchi?