Thirsty Thursdays: My Top 12 Bars When Backpacking In North Korea

While North Korea is hardly world renowned as a wacaday “party country” or somewhere to get ridiculously drunk and go on pub crawls, of course there are bars and restaurants there that are open to foreigners. Anyone who believes the biased western media excrement is stupid – the country has bars and they know their stuff here, plus it has a few breweries and wineries. Again – if you haven’t backpacked North Korea, you don’t have a clue. I loved backpacking in North Korea and although I covered my best bars in Pyongyang before, now it’s time for my best bars in the whole country, on the whole trip. We flew into Pyongyang then backpacked through Kaesong and the DMZ and all the way back up north before boarding the party train to Dandong, China.

I was on tour with Young Pioneer Tours (you can get 5% off future tours if you tell them you saw them through Don’t Stop Living). YPT took us to a load of cool bars and restaurants while in Pyongyang and also while backpacking Kaesong. Unless things change, you’ll be accompanied to these bars at all times by your guides, but that makes partying in Pyongyang a unique experience. Here are my favourite bars in North Korea…MY top 12 from my visit, of course I don’t know the country inside out as I was merely scratching the surface in a 6 day trip, but when Thirsty Thursdays comes round, I’m up for a North Korean beer!

1.Revolving Restaurant, Pyongyang

When you are backpacking in North Korea (at least when I was there), you are accompanied by tour companies, the best of which is Young Pioneer Tours of course. This means they usually organise your accommodation for you and there are only a small choice of hotels here. There are not really any backpacker hostels in evidence and we ended up in the swanky 5 star Yanggakdo Hotel.

The top floor of the Yanggakdo Hotel has a magnificent revolving restaurant. This offers commanding views over Pyongyang city. We had a buffet lunch here and of course a North Korean beer!

2.Taedonggang Diplomatic Club (“The Diplo”), Pyongyang

Taedonggang Diplomatic Club, nicknamed “The Diplo” is an ice cool swanky, state of the art venue which seems to mix a leisure centre with a nightclub with a sports centre. It’s a meeting place for foreigners, ex-pats and a few local richer North Koreans. This was the only nightclub I was in in North Korea and what a cool place.

If you can get this on your tour as an option, take it. It’s all a bit surreal. There I was playing pool with a North Korean guy (and I beat him) in a posh bar in downtown Pyongyang. The weird thing is they serve a load of foreign products and not local ones. You can get Heineken beer, Baileys Irish Cream and Johnnie Walker Whiskey. All this while R.E.M. hit “The One I Love” pumps out, followed by Madonna’s “Like A Virgin”.

You can talk to locals freely here, and some of them will speak English. We also met an expatriate from Pakistan who was chilling out there. English is used on some of the signs within the club which is unusual. Swimming, games room and karaoke are also options. I loved it. It was the nearest thing we got to a “nightclub in Pyongyang”. Plus there are a lot of bars here in one complex! Let your hair down, it ain’t strict here.

3.Chilson Restaurant, Pyongyang

We attend North Korea’s annual parade on National Day (9/9) and what a magnificent parade it was! Nearby we pass an ice cream shop and a pizzeria, but our choice for lunch is the trendy Chilson Restaurant.

Lunch here was the only time we had non-Korean food in North Korea. It was chicken wings, sausages and chips! I also had a local beer on tap in here, a really top spot The Chilson!

4.Cold Noodles Restaurant, Pyongyang

They say you haven’t really backpacked in North Korea if you haven’t tried cold noodles. We headed to the Cold Noodles restaurant in Pyongyang and it was served in a silver bowl. I had one beer in here, but even though I am smiling, neither the beer or the cold noodles were my favourite dish from my time in North Korea.

5.Koryo Restaurant, Kaesong

After touring the DMZ, the sights of Kaesong and the post office (where I was able to buy stamps and post postcards), we went to the Koryo Restaurant for lunch. I was surprised to find a bar in here for my only ever beer in Kaesong! I was able to take one away for the bus as well. Food was a range of Korean small silver dishes which included kimchi and vegetables.

6.The “Party Train Bar” Pyongyang To Dandong

After checking out of our hotel, The Yanggakdo Hotel, we head to Pyongyang Central Train Station. From here, we will take the long train ride north towards the China border. It must be stressed that you NEED a double entry visa for China when backpacking North Korea. The reason is – you enter North Korea and leave it via China.

After leaving Pyongyang behind, we find out there is an actual bar and restaurant on this train, as well as a local lad who is selling some beer. I prefer the local beer to the dreaded Heineken, but we all dive in, grab some food and beer and it is time for a party as we leave behind the farms and fields of North Korea.

7.The Brewery Bar, Yanggakdo Hotel, Yanggak Island, Pyongyang

Yes, there is a brewery in a hotel in Pyongyang that brews their own beer. And shock horror, it’s good!! I love knocking back a cold pint of “Yanggakdo Beer”. There were two varieties – a lager and an ale so I tried both. I was there in 2013 so I’d imagine there is a bigger selection now.

Live sports is also shown on the television there. This is on Floor 2/By the reception of the Yanggakdo Hotel, where we stayed in Pyongyang. Beers are standard price of 22 RMB ($3 US Dollars, £3). North Korean Won is officially not allowed to be used by foreigners while in the country.

8. Barbecued Lamb Restaurant and Bar, Pyongyang

The Barbecued Lamb Restaurant and bar is an odd place. At the front entrance, you arrive at a “local bar” with what looks like a load of hard working locals sipping cold beer and eating after a long day of work. It has the feel of a pub! You can talk to them no problem, and language may be the only barrier.

Meanwhile out the back, live music is accompanied by dancing. You are readily encouraged to join in while you get barbecued lamb, squid and duck. I asked our guide Chen if the restaurant had a name and the reply was “Barbecued Lamb Restaurant“, so we’ll go with that. I’m sure that’s not the real name of the bar and restaurant.

And also – we had barbecued lamb in here and it was good! You cook it yourself at your table on a barbecue.

9. Karaoke Bar, Yanggakdo Hotel, Yanggak Island, Pyongyang

North Korean people, like their nearby Asian counterparts love karaoke, it was also a thing for me when backpacking Taiwan and South Korea. North Korea offers a load of places to sing, but our tour was action packed from 7 a.m. until midnight each day we were busy! If you run out of time, you can get your group together and simply sing karaoke in your hotel. Both the Koryo Hotel and Yanggakdo Hotel have karaoke bars. I got up and did a rendition of Michael Jackson’s “Black or White”. It completed a double for me, as I had sang it in South Korea in a Noraebang in 2011. Beers are as cheap as 10 RMB by the way ($1.50 US Dollars / £1 Northern Irish pound) and they have a full English list of songs which came as a surprise. Especially when I got up and sang Common People by Pulp. Epic.

10.Pyongyang Casino Bar, Pyongyang

The casino doesn’t allow photography inside, like most casinos the world over but I nabbed a quick photo at the door and on the pokies/fruities which was quiet and permitted. The beer was sold in the bar opposite and was also as cheap as 10 RMB ($1.50 US Dollars / £1 Northern Irish pound).

11.Barbecued Duck Restaurant, Pyongyang

You might think I was getting greedy here backpacking through the barbecue bars of the Yang, but it’s because the tours include ALL the food so you might as well take it, plus we were generally eating and drinking in different restaurants and bars each time (except for breakfast which was always in the hotel).

The barbecued duck restaurant was quite sociable and we had some shots of North Korean Soju here as well as the local beer. We cooked all the duck ourselves on the barbecue.

12. Bowling Bar, Yanggakdo Hotel, Yanggak Island, Pyongyang

The first beer I paid for in North Korea was actually in the Bowling Bar in the Yanggakdo Hotel. We had previously got a beer included as part of our lunch in a downtown restaurant, but here at the bowling bar they have a good range of beers and spirits – mostly local. It was only 8RMB for a beer here, and served cold from the fridge. This was my cheapest beer in the country at $1 US Dollar (80 pence). You’ll also have the option of going ten pin bowling. We were so busy on this trip that we turned it down, in fact that’s the only thing we turned down, and it was because I wanted to get my travel blog up to date and relax with a beer.

There is currently no Irish Bar or British Bar in Pyongyang however…I invented one…

13.Pyongyang Ulster Irish Pub

Are you kidding me? There’s an Ulster Irish Pub in Pyongyang??? Yes, there is but it’s very much a DIY type bar. You simply bring a few tins of Guinness into the country and burst the beer open in your hotel room…I also had a mini bottle of Bushmills Irish Honey with me. I also had a Guinness at the North Korea to South Korea border at the DMZ. I brought in 8 cans of Guinness to North Korea – 1 I drank in my hotel room, 1 I drank at the border with my mate Robert from Republic of Ireland. The other six cans I gave to my North Korean guides – they were loving it!

Backpacking in Pyongyang is special and different for many reasons – I especially loved the lack of external advertising, very few imports and how it is much more authentically Korean than the southern part (South Korea). South Korea is drenched in imports, globalisation and western propaganda like Ratsbux and DickMonalds from USA. North Korea rises stronger than all of that. Here are a few other photos of bars and drinks in North Korea.

Drinking in Pyongyang and North Korea offers a lot less variety than some other capital cities, but trust me, that’s a good thing. Enjoy your nights out in Pyongyang. Try the local beer, chat to a few locals and savour the spirit of a self proud country which has kept the communist dream alive a century after it all began. Share your beer and party the night away. Pyongyang will shock you. Get your North Korea visa, fly into Pyongyang and enjoy yourself!

Here are some of my videos from the bars of North Korea:

Top 5 Bars in Pyongyang, Bowling Bar:

Top 5 Bars in Pyongyang, Barbecued Lamb Restaurant:

Top 5 Bars in Pyongyang, The Diplo:

Top 5 Bars in Pyongyang, Karaoke Bar:

Thirsty Thursdays is an ongoing regular feature on Don’t Stop Living – a lifestyle of travel. If you have a bar, pub, drink, restaurant, brand or idea that you would like featured on Thirsty Thursdays, please get in touch via my contacts page or my advertising page. I’d love to hear from you, and I’d also love a free North Korean blueberry wine or a beer! Slainte!