This morning the plan was to retrieve our tickets to Nami Island (which is happening in a few days) at Insadong and the Korail tickets at Seoul Station. The best and most convenient way to get around Seoul is taking the MTR. Tickets can be bought from ticket machines like ones below, or if you have a T money card they can easily be recharged or bought from the blue machines.
The trains come very often here, perhaps every 5 minutes but no more than 10. Before it comes, a short musical fanfare from the speakers will blast through which never fails to delight me. A bit of warning though, the doors don't bounce back if you get between them so jump onto the train as quick as you can before they close! Inside the trains we saw some aunties wheeling around their cart of goods like gloves and beanies, announcing their bargains to the passengers.
We arrived at Insadong via a stop at Jonggak station and a 10 minute walk which required a bit of Google Mapping and non-suspiciously tailing a group of young school kids. It was still early when we got there and the place was pretty empty as stores are just preparing to open. We later found out that stores in Korea open around 11am and close pretty late at night.
The Nami Island office doesn't stand out so much, but luckily I caught my eye on the 'Gallery Sang' building where the office was supposed to be located. Inside was a touristy clothes and souvenirs store, but after asking one of the workers there, she pointed to a stair case that led up to the 3rd floor where the office was. Once inside they confirmed my booking (which was done back at home a week prior) and I paid 23 000W for the shuttle bus round trip and entrance fee. In exchange they gave me the receipt which I was supposed to show the bus driver on the day, and the map of the bus station. We chose the Jamsil stop since it will be closer to us at that time. We also grabbed an English copy of the brochure and map. Oh and the workers there can speak English so no language barrier problems =) [Link to info and how to book]
So after the morning search we finally decided to have breakfast in a small noodle restaurant in Insadong.
One of the things I love about coming to Asia is that food is dirt cheap! And amazing. For a chilly dry morning, I decided to choose a nice hot bowl of Buchon Noodles for 4500W.
Ah yes and there's always the bonus side dishes every meal comes with (in this case kimchi and pickles).
My friend chose a soup of wonton herself. The meal was a great way to boost our energy levels for our first full day in Seoul.
I came to Ssamzie-gil the last time I was in Korea, and it was a delight to see what changes they have made. This courtyard houses many arts and crafts stores, and you can spend hours casually going up each level and admiring some original works like paintings, toys, jewellery and bags.
At the rooftop I was happy to see some snow in the area. Decorating this area were hundreds of colorful cute tags written by couples much like the couple-locks on the Eiffel Tower. There was even a small alley filled with these tags, with written words and wishes of ever-lasting love and happiness.
But enough of the sappy love stuff. It was time to travel to Seoul Station to book our tickets to Busan and Jeonju and get the boring stuff out of the way. The process took us longer than we expected when we realized too late that we were lining up in the wrong line...So what we were actually supposed to do was to make our way further into the station towards the blue roof information center (right photo below) with our KTX coupons. They exchanged our coupons for the actual KR-Passes, which we then brought to the ticket counter to book our actual tickets and seats.
Ticket booth.
By the time we got our tickets it was already noon, so we headed to our third destination - Myeondong. There we only did one thing - shopping. From the Faceshop, Clio, Nature Republic and Etude, we ventured into each cosmetic store and came out with heavy bags of wonderful goods. Heavy, but wonderful goods =) During our money spending experience, we stopped by a small cafe for a good coffee break. The interior was cozy with cute wooden square dolls in Christmas hats decorated around the store.
The coffee wasn't cheap though, the price from memory was around $US6-7. Personally I find that coffee in Korea is pretty weak, compared to what I used to have back at home in Australia.
For dinner we stayed in Myeondong and had our first kimchi hot pot experience.
And what a brilliant choice it was! The soup contained ramen, beanshoots, Tteokbokki/rice cake (my fav!), fried fishcake and probably other bits and pieces. Ooh having that is a must in the winter!
For some evening fun, we went over to the side of Cheonggyechon river where I was told that it has some very nice night lights and a mini waterfall. The downside was bringing my tripod along, and I do believe I was the only person with one amongst the crowd of people who flocked there that night.
A non-traditional red/blue ice Christmas tree. This made me crave for some ice shaving dessert...
The lantern like display above us was amazing. There was also some kind of wishing well in the middle of the river where people would try to flick their coins into.
Finally for tonight's dessert, we bought some very big and perfect looking strawberries. And boy were they sweet and juicy!
We also bought some string candy in Myeondong, with either peanut or chocolate filling. I preferred the strawberries though. Gosh think of the strawberry milkshakes you can make with those...*que drooling onto keyboard*
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