Standing along the Demilitarized Zone, a woman trained her phone camera toward North Korea and the granite peaks of the Kumgang Mountains.

“Please do not take any pictures here,” a ROK soldier told her. “Ma’am, no pictures.” 

The tourist continued to snap shots through the border fence.

“NO PICTURES,” the soldier finally shouted.

The woman was part of a group of South Koreans, all retirement-age, who had signed up to walk a section of the DMZ Peace Trail, a network of about a dozen footpaths along the southern edge of the world’s most heavily fortified border.

Opened in 2019, when