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I take back what I said in my last post regarding snow and traffic. We left the house around 2:00 pm Sunday. Just as we were leaving, it started to snow. Traffic was light on the expressway until we were under a kilometer away from the tollgate south of Seoul. Then it came to a halt. I've been in bad traffic in Korea, particularly so on major holidays, but this was arguably the worst I'd ever seen. I've no idea what sort of traffic reports my wife was watching, but they were off by quite a bit.
We left the expressway and hit the back roads. Traffic was very, very light off the highways. It seems everyone on the mass holiday exodus thinks the expressway is faster, even when traffic is heavy. I don't quite get that logic. I'm certain that, had we stayed on the expressway, it would have taken us around six hours to make the trip (which is an-hour-and-a-half in normal conditions). On the back roads, we were able to make it in under four hours, and that includes a little over an hour stuck in traffic on the expressway and a 20-minute break at a rest stop.
My advice to anyone making a road trip out of Seoul during the Lunar New Year or Chuseok holidays: don't. But if you must, don't take a bus. Even the bus lanes get clogged with traffic when people get frustrated. You'd be better off in a car, if you can get one, and on the empty back roads.