Seoul: Traffic on major highways eased slightly across South Korea on Saturday afternoon, the first day of the five-day Lunar New Year holiday. The nation will observe its major holiday, known as Seol, on Tuesday, characterized by family reunions and ancestral rites. The holiday period began over the weekend and continues through Wednesday.

According to Yonhap News Agency, as of 5 p.m., a drive from Seoul to the southeastern port city of Busan, 330 kilometers away, was expected to take approximately four hours and 30 minutes, showing a decrease from nearly seven hours in the morning. A trip to the southwestern city of Gwangju, some 260 kilometers south of the capital, was estimated to take three hours and 20 minutes.

Travel times heading toward Seoul were similar, with the drive from Busan expected to take four hours and 30 minutes, and the trip from Gwangju estimated at three hours and 20 minutes. The Korea Expressway Corp. estimated that 4.85 million vehicles would traverse nationwide on Saturday, including 460,000 cars leaving the greater Seoul area and 370,000 heading toward it.