Gimpo Marine Corps Cultural Festival at Daemyeong Port
🗓️ 2026.11.07 ~ 2026.11.07
The Gimpo Marine Corps Cultural Festival at Daemyeong Port is a one-day festival that honors the strong spirit and tradition of the Marine Corps while making the most of the region’s identity as the station of the 2nd Marine Division. It offers citizens a direct way to see, feel, and communicate with Marine Corps culture through equipment displays, performances by the military band and honor guard, a steel muscle competition, and hands-on activities such as dog tag and eight-cornered cap making.
The festival is divided into two connected themes. By day, the focus is on Marine Corps culture; by night, the Sunset Night Market takes over the rooftop plaza of the seafood direct sales center. There, visitors can enjoy Gimpo’s food, including seasonal seafood, local food, and self-barbecue. At dusk, the market adopts a night market atmosphere, with busking performances set against the sunset over Daemyeong Port.
This combination makes the event distinctive: two themed festivals—Marine Corps culture by day and sunset and food by night—are experienced together in one space.
1. Main Programs
- Marine Corps equipment exhibition and experience, military band and honor guard performances, Sunset Night Market (Daemyeong Port direct sales center rooftop), etc.
2. Side Events and Programs
- Military uniform experience, dog tag making, eight-cornered cap making, laser shooting experience, etc.
Event Details
- đź“Ť Address: 110-36 Daemyeonghang 1-ro, Daegot-myeon, Gimpo-si, Gyeonggi-do
- 🛏️ Accommodation near the event
- đź’° Fee: Free
- đź“ž Inquiry: 031-980-5110
- 🖥️ Website: https://www.gimpo.go.kr/u/53850
What is Daemyeong Port?
Daemyeong Port is a working harbor on the western edge of Gimpo, where the Han River meets the tidal waters of the West Sea. For most of its history, it served as a fishing and ferry point for the surrounding villages. Boats went out before dawn and returned in the afternoon with their catches. The tidal flats beside the harbor remain wide and are used by migratory shorebirds and by people digging for shellfish.
The port’s facilities are modest: old concrete seawalls, a short wharf, and rows of mooring buoys. At low tide the water pulls back far enough to open a broad view of the mudflats. In the evening, markets operate on the flat ground just behind the seawall. The site has also been used as a military post at different periods, and traces of that use survive in the area’s layout. The festival takes place within this working setting. It includes formal ceremony, but the surrounding place remains what it is during any other evening: a harbor with boats, tide, mud, and people gathered around food and stalls.
