Seoul 2014: Day 7 (Lotte World)

27 MAY: Lotte World

                  Gangnam     

For Day 7, we decided to head down to Lotte World! They have both an indoor and outdoor theme park. The indoor rides caters more for young children while the outdoor one has more thrilling rides. 

To get there: Jamsil Line 2 - Exit 4

Lotte World (Indoor)

Lotte World Adventure

Operating Hours: 09.30 - 22.00

Admission Fee: 46000KRW for Adults

The indoor rides were mostly slow paced like the hot air balloon ride that allowed you to go one round around to get a helicopter view of the whole indoor arena. It was nice at first but you will probably get really bored halfway through the ride. 

They have staged performers for kids that were fun and entertaining, even for adults.

We were lucky to have managed to catch the indoor costume parade with many recognizable characters. The actors and actresses were all really lovely and ready to pose for your cameras. They also had short stops with simple dance moves to engage with the young children. 

Castle Passageway at Lotte World

Here's the passageway leading towards the outdoor Lotte World. Unfortunately, I don't have a picture of the outdoor arena. The outdoor rides are slightly more thrilling. Unfortunately, two of the more thrilling rides which were down for maintenance when I was there. 

I was disappointed with Lotte World as I expected more in terms of more fun and thrilling rides. There was also only one roller coaster which was indoor. Luckily, we managed to take it a few times before the queue became longer and longer. 

Do visit Lotte World early at around 10am as there is hardly any crowd in the morning. We managed to take most of the rides a few times because there wasn't a queue in the morning. As it becomes closer to noon, most of the rides had queues that was half an hour long.



Here's my two cents worth about Lotte World; I feel that Lotte World is more suitable if you're coming with young children as they have a lot of activities and rides suited for young children. If you're someone looking for thrilling theme park rides, I think there are other better theme park choices for you in Seoul. 

Seoul 2014: Day 6 Part II (N Seoul Tower)

26 MAY: Myeongdong

                  N Seoul Tower

After all the shopping at Myeongdong, we headed to N Seoul Tower!! The must-go tourist attraction spot. 

To get there: Myeongdong station Line 4 -Exit 3

You have to head to Seoul Tower to take a cable car to Namsam Tower. Exit from the station and use the road to the right of pacific hotel and walk 10 minutes up to the namsam cable car station. Then take the cable car to N seoul tower (3 minute cable car ride)

N Seoul  Tower (N서울타워)

Mon-Thur/Sun: 10AM-11PM

Fri/Sat: 10AM-12Midnight

You will reach the place in the image on the left to take the horizontal lift up to take the cable car. Reach before 10pm to catch the cable car.

Price for a Round Trip for the Cable Car: 8500 KRW

You'll need to queue to get on the cable car so I would recommend you to take visit N Seoul Tower on a weekday. Also if you can, leave N Seoul Tower earlier as the queue to return back here is really long after 10 to 11 pm. 

This was the queue we faced when trying to get on the cable car to return. It's longer than this as it gets later cause the queue got longer behind us. 

When you walk up the long stairs to actually reach N Seoul Tower after getting off the cable car, you will pass by this amazing tornado chips. They are seriously delicious but expensive. As you can see from the picture, it costs 5000KRW each. 

You have to try them cause they are really really nice. 

The view at Namsam Tower was breathtaking. I really loved it. You can actually get to see these amazing scenes without paying. It's at the area with the famous love locks and bent bench. 

Or, you can pay to get up to the Observatory. What you get at the Observatory is the souvenir shops and those binoculars that you have to drop 500KRW in to use. Also, as you take the lift up to the Observatory, they play pretty animation on the ceiling of the lift. 

Observatory Admission Fee: 9000KRW

Honestly speaking I wouldn't encourage you to go up to the observatory. Reason being that the brightly lit shops inside reflects light onto the glass windows looking out into the nightview. Hence, it's impossible to take pictures or even view the nightscene without seeing the reflection from the lights inside. The view is also possible to view from the love locks area as I have mentioned above. 

When I visit Seoul again, I would love to visit Namsam Tower during the morning.

For dinner, we settled with Cup Noodles from the convenience store near Banana Backpackers as we were exhausted and it was really late too.

I don't know if it was because I was famished or that the noodles was super nice. 

That's it for the day.  

Seoul 2014: Day 6 Part I (Myeongdong)

26 MAY: Myeongdong

                    N Seoul Tower

Finally! Korea's famous shopping paradise, Myeongdong (명동 쇼핑가)! 

To get there: Myeongdong Station Line 4 - Exits 5, 6, 7 & 8.

When we first exited out from the station, we met the friendly people in red (that I mentioned in this post) Since we had to settle breakfast, we asked for some recommendation and got a free map* of Myeongdong from them as well. We decided on Myeongdong Gyoza (명동교자).

*We navigated around Myeongdong with a lot of help from the free map as well as asking other people in red. 

The prices at Myeongdong or rather the whole menu is displayed at the front of the store. You can zoom in to view them. 

All of the dishes are priced at 8000 KRW. It does seem expensive, but I feel that it was worth for the quality of the food you get. 

We ordered a tray of mandu (dumplings) and a bowl of kalguksu (noodle) to share for a light breakfast. It's not bad for breakfast and we were able to avoid the lunch crowd. 

After breakfast, it's shopping time! Since it was our 6th day, we were running low on KRW. There are money exchange shops around Myeongdong that you can easily find as you walk around. Their rates are not bad and actually, higher than what we got in Singapore. 

Myeongdong Underground Shopping Centre

If shopping above ground was not enough for you, head underground! And this is where you can buy all the Kpop albums!!! The underground shopping area is similar to what you will get at the one at Dongdaemun. However, I believe that it is generally cheaper over here. 

The main priority for most tourists at Myeongdong was cosmetics and skin care besides shopping for clothes. You can check out my other more detailed post on some of my shopping in Seoul. 

Warning: if you are going to Myeongdong to buy a lot of skincare or cosmetic products, buy them last. I bought them quite early and had to lug the HUGE and many bags all around. In the end, we decided to head back to the banana backpackers to drop our shopping loot before heading back to continue shopping again. I didn't take a picture of what we had to carry, especially me because of what I bought from Laneige, but trust me, it was insanely heavy and burdensome. 

The cosmetic/skin care shops in Seoul, especially in Myeongdong is famous for giving samples even if you're just entering the shop and not buying anything. This is true to some extent but don't expect all the shops to give you samples. Also, it's quite awkward to just get the samples and leave. They usually place the samples in those small baskets and pass them to you. So yeah, imagine retrieving the samples and giving them an empty basket back. Awkward. 

However, I was really happy to get two mask samples that had Super Junior on them cause I'm a HUGE fan of them and they weren't selling those masks anymore. 

International and korean brands like Spao (Spao is not an expensive brand but Super Junior are their models and I've always wanted to visit their store) were all around Myeongdong. At the same time, there were shops that were similar to those in Ehwa and Hongdae. It's really the shopping haven. 

We decided to take a break from lugging the shopping bags and visited O'sulloc Tea House. I actually bought green tea leaves from them earlier on at Insadong but we visited them this time round to try out their cafe. 

O'sulloc Tea House

I can't remember the prices but you HAVE to try the green tea drink with the ice cream on top. Something like a root beer float but with green tea drink and ice cream instead. I usually don't fancy green tea products besides the tea itself. But this was amazing. 

The green tea roll cake was soft, moist and absolutely gorgeous. I expected the tiramisu to taste better than the roll cake but the roll cake took me by surprise. The tiramisu was nice too but the roll cake was even better. If you don't want to try both, get the roll cake.  

Seoul 2014: Day 5 Part II (Noryangjin Fish Market, Hongdae)

25 MAY: Noryangjin Fish Market

Hongdae       

At Hongdae: First stop, the Trickeye Museum!

As of now, Singapore already has it's own Trickeye Museum so I feel that you should just go for the one in Singapore. I heard that it's almost similar. But if i'm not wrong, there isn't the Ice Museum which comes together with the Trickeye Museum ticket. 

To get there: Hong-ik University Station (홍대입구역) Line 2 - Exit 9. Make your second left after exit, and then make second right after Starbucks, and walk for about two blocks. 

This is about half of the area. There's a small slide at the
back that you can play with. 

Trick Eye Museum + Ice Museum (트릭아이미술관)

Honestly, there isn't much in the Ice Museum. I went there when it was near summer so I dressed light. But it's extremely cold in the Ice Museum and they don't provide jackets for you or anything. Furthermore, you can't exit to get warm and enter again because the ticket is one-entry. It's quite small and there's just various ice sculptures things for you to take pictures with while you are freezing inside.

Next, we just roamed around the Hongdae area. Unfortunately, it started raining so we headed to the Hello Kitty Cafe* to get shelter and food. Google Maps came to help yet again. 

Interior of the Hello Kitty Cafe at Hongdae

Prices:

Fresh Cream Waffle: 2500KRW

Drinks: ~3000KRW

Tiramisu: ~6000KRW

I loved the fresh cream waffle. Normally, I don't like to eat fresh cream but theirs tasted great with the waffle. 

*The Hongdae outlet has closed based on Tripadvisor.com

Another stopover for us was StyleNanda! We found the place with help from the people in red. Not sure if I mentioned this before but there are people who wear red vests with a big 'i' who are there to help lost tourists like us. They are mostly around tourist attraction areas like Bukchon Hanok Village, Hongdae, Myeongdong, etc.

My friend and I wanted to go there for the free photobooth and not really for the clothes or makeup. Hahaha. Their clothes are relatively expensive but their makeup is really popular. Everyone who was in the shop mainly crowd around the makeup corner. 

I bought their nail polish at 4000KRW because I love painting my nails. Their nail polish is really not bad. The brush is flat and it's really easy to apply the nail polish on your nails. They have a wide range of colours available there. I recommend you to get some to try it out. 

Shopping at Hongdae means slightly higher prices compared to Ehwa but there are a lot of shops that sells things that are less common. Less common in the sense that the shops in Ehwa pretty much sells the same things but Hongdae has more variety which explains the higher prices. 

Now time for dinner!

Being a huge fan of Running Man,I wanted to try the BBQ shop that Haha opened. It used to be called Paljamakchang and Gary has another outlet at Gangnam area as well. But after renovation, it's called 401 now. 

There's no more grilled intestines like in Paljamakchang which I wanted to try so that's quite sad. But there's of course Samgyeopsal!

The menu with the prices.

There's nothing special for the samgyeopsal and all but it was a decent dinner to end the day!

Seoul 2014: Day 5 Part I (Noryangjin Fish Market, Hongdae)

25 MAY: Noryangjin Fish Market

Hongdae       

Day 5, the halfway mark for my 9-day trip!

For breakfast, we headed to Noryangjin Fish Market (노량진수산시장) ! For an absolute seafood lover like me, it was one of my most anticipated destinations. Even though seafood for breakfast in the early morning sounds insane but it was quite out of the way based on the train lines. I was quite worried about heading there because from online reviews etc, it seems like the stall holders may charge you a higher price because you're a tourist. But, it's seafood. Seafood is always worth the risk. 

How to get there: Noryangjin Station (노량진역) Line 1 - Exit 1

When you exit the station, look for this bridge. You will see a small sort of open space carpark area. The stairwell leading to the fish market will be on your left.

Walking down the stairwell, the fishy smell will be the prove that you're in the right direction.








Now for a look at the Noryangjin Fish Market that Google probably has tons of.

Noryangjin Fish Market

A closer look

Everyone sells pretty much the same kinds of seafood so it's really difficult to decide which stall to patronize. I was trying to see which ajumma seems like she isn't out to cheat my money. In the end, we patronized one stall which I unfortunately did not take a picture of. However, it was on our left and on the right of the second stairwell. The first stairwell would be the one you came down from.

They had one worker who was able to speak Chinese and he seemed really friendly (probably cause he was trying to earn our money but anyway) And he told us that everyone around here sells at around the same price which was probably true.

After his suggestions and us asking questions about the pricing of the seafood, we decided on one 'wild' 比目鱼 (Bi Mu Fish), scallops and prawns. I have no idea what specific kind of scallops and prawns we had though. Why I would mention 'wild' for the fish is because they had wild ones and farmed raised ones. Apparently or rather the obviously the wild ones would be nicer but ~15000KRW more expensive if i didn't remember wrongly.

Based on my memory,
Fish - 30000KRW - 40000KRW
Prawns - 10000 - 20000KRW
Scallops - 10000-15000KRW

I think we paid ~75000KRW in total and this is just for the seafood without the 'cooking fee'. The chinese speaking guy then brought us to this restaurant, Ttosune Restaurant (just up the staircase on their left) to get them to cook the seafood for us.

For the fish, there was three choices: Raw fish slices, Steamed or Stew. We decided on Raw fish slices for one half and steamed for the other.

For the prawns and scallop, BBQ!

If you can read Hangul, they have the prices for cooking pasted around the shop.

The shop was empty when we entered probably cause it was early in the morning. But the area was clean and spacious.

Feast your eyes on these AMAZING seafood!!

The raw fish was the definite clear champion out of the four. Even my friend who didn't like sashimi LOVED it! Eating it after dipping it in gochujang is just pure goodness! I HIGHLY RECOMMEND you to try it. And don't steam the fish. The steamed fish was really disappointing. I think the stew option would be better but the raw fish is even better. We really regretted not having the raw fish slices option for the whole fish. It's super addictive. 

After eating, time to pay the bill. For the cooking fee alone, it was ~35000KRW. 

Noryangjin Fish Market definitely TOPPED my list for my next trip to Korea. You MUST come here especially if you're a seafood lover. 

Seoul 2014: Day 3 Part I (Gyeongbokgung, Bukchon Hanok Village)

23 MAY: Gyeongbokgung

                            Bukchon Hanok Village
                Samcheongdong

     Insadong

Before heading to Gyeongbokgung, we headed to the famous Tosokchon Samgyetang (토속촌 삼계탕)

Toksokchon Samgyetang

To get there: Gyeongbokgung MRT station Exit 2.

Walk straight until you reach a cross junction with a convenience store GS25 on your left. Turn into the lane and you should see Tosokchon.

Toksokchon was honestly speaking not as amazing as i thought. Maybe it was because I had super high expectations. My friends enjoyed it but it was just okay for me. Tender chicken meet with sticky glutinous rice hidden inside. They have a small cup of ginseng for you to add in so you can adjust the amount you want to your own liking. 

From Toksokchon, we headed to Gyeongbokgung! 

To get there*: 
From Toksokchon, exit from the small lane. Facing the main road, turn left. Walk all the way straight until you see a traffic light on your right and cross over. Continue walking straight and you will see the traditional palace walls. Turn right and walk along the walls. You will see some entrance on your left. Enter and walk all the way in to reach the main entrance area of Gyeongbokgung. 

Areas you will pass by

*Sorry for the long directions

Gyeongbokgung was really pretty and a definite MUST go when you come to Seoul. Especially if you love all those ancient drama series. It was amazing to be at the same place where they filmed dramas like "The Moon that Embraces the Sun".

Some shots of the beautiful Gyeongbokgung

Next Up, Bukchon Hanok Village!

We asked the ice-cream ahjusshi on how to get there and it was rather complicated. Can't really remember it well but I'm sure the ice-cream ahjusshi will be there to help! I can only remember that you turn left when u exit from Gyeongbokgung's main entrance, then turn left again and walk all the way straight. 

Two prominent sculptures you will pas by on your way to Bukchon Hanok Village

Upon reaching Bukchon Hanok Village...

They have sort of a route for you to follow to finish the touring the whole area but we ended up walking to only one part and u-turned back unintentionally. 

Bukchon Hanok Village

Although it's a tourist attraction, there are people living there in those traditional houses so it's important to keep the noise level low. It's a beautiful place though you have to be prepared to climb a lot of uphills. 

I give Gyeongbokgung and Bukchon Hanok Village my two thumbs up!

Seoul 2014: Day 2 Part II (Ehwa University)

22 MAY: Gwangjang Market 

           Ehwa University

Deng deng deng deng, next stop, Ehwa University!

To get there: Ehwa University Station (이화여자대학교) Line 2 - Exit 2 and 3

A street along Ehwa University

Once you exit out from the subway, the shopping area near Ehwa University will either be on your left (Exit 2) or right (Exit 3). From then on, it is pretty much just walking around randomly. 

If you want to visit Ehwa University, just continue walking straight from the direction mentioned above. 

Intersection before Ehwa University

Ehwa University is really pretty with all the greenery around it and the modern and minimalistic design of this school building. 

We went in to get a glimpse of the interior of the building and it was really impressive. While we didn't exactly tour the inside of the building, just briefly looking around was enough to make me go wow. 

Ehwa University Campus

After taking lots of photos at Ehwa University, it's time to shop!

The clothes are cheap here with a lot of shops selling shirts and dresses all at 10000KRW. But after you visit a few shops, you realize that these shops are selling around the same stuff. You could still try your luck as some shops may have some variations. 

The shoes are mostly above 20000KRW. There's this intersection with two shoe shops directly opposite each other. They have a myriad of shoes here so you can probably find at least one shoe that you like. If you and your friends are interested in getting shoes, I would suggest you to come here and buy together so that you can bargain for more discounts!

There are some shops that sells shoes a little cheaper at around 20000KRW at Myeongdong which was where i bought one of my shoes. However, the designs are more limited compared to the ones available here.

Street Food: Cheese Egg Bread

There's a lot of random street food along the streets of Ehwa University so you can easily grab a bite while shopping!

This cheese egg bread at 1000KRW is just one of the many street food i tried there.

We chanced upon this Notriter cafe located on the second level of the shophouses which was near Yes APM. While expensive, the ambient and setup of the cafe was really nice. They have sort of like a Japanese style seating arrangement and it's nice and comfortable. Great for a rest after all those shopping.

However, each customer is expected to buy a drink or something from their cafe. Their drinks are priced around 6000 to 7000KRW.

Noriter Cafe

To continue the food trail, next up is Patbingsu!

Homilbat

Patbingsu is really the best way to beat the heat! At Homilbat, the separate the ice and the red bean for you. You can choose to pour the red bean in or not. It's really up to you. I tried the milk and greentea bingsu.The white dough-like thing above the red bean is called dduk/tteok. It tastes a little like muah chee but a little more chewy. 

Homilbat (호밀밭) 
Seoul, Seodaemun-gu, Changcheon-dong 4-77

The price is around 5000KRW to 7000KRW.

To get there: Walk till you reach the intersection before Ehwa University (picture above). Then turn right and walk all the way down. You will pass by a roundabout and Sinchon Station will be on your right. Homilbat will be on your left, two streets after the roundabout. 

To end the day, we had Jajangmeon for dinner!

We asked the friendly counter staff at Banana Backpackers to help us order Jajangmeon. It takes less than half an hour or even 15min for the delivery to arrive.

Our huge servings of Jajangmeon with side dishes

We ordered three servings of Jajangmeon and tangsukyuk (sweet and sour pork). The other side dishes and the mandu (dumplings) are service which means that they just give it to us for free. We got the mandu probably because we ordered quite a lot. There's only three of us but we sort of unintentionally ordered enough for 5 people (they gave us 5 pairs of chopsticks). Ooops. 

I'm not a fan of the jajangmeon cause it was too sticky for me but the tansukyuk was great. Especially since they were served hot despite it being a delivery. Overall, it was a good meal :)

After eating, you can just throw everything into the plastic bag they give and place it outside the main entrance of Banana Backpackers. 

That's it for a whole full day of shopping!

Seoul 2014: Day 2 Part I (Gwangjang Market)

Day 2 of my 9D8N in South Korea, Seoul!

22 MAY: Gwangjang Market

            Ehwa University

First Stop, Gwangjang Market (광장시장)!

How to get there: Jongno 5-ga Station (종로5-가역) Line 1 - exit 8 (start of the market) or Exit 9 (Nearest to the food section)

A glimpse into Gwangjang Market

When we arrived at Gwangjang Market, it was nearly 10am. We headed straight to the food section to get a taste of the bean pancakes and other traditional food!

We bought the bean pancakes or Bindaetteok from this stall in the middle of the intersection in the market. I think they are the only stall here that only sells the bean pancakes so they're hard to miss. The stall ahjummas are not the most friendly people and they kinda just ignore tourists. So you have to go up to her to order your pancakes because i don't think she will approach you otherwise. 

Our half-eaten pancake

Anyway, they sell the pancakes in big and small sizes. We didn't indicate the size that we want so she just gave us the bigger one. It was too much for 3 people to finish especially if you still want to try the other food there. 

They also gave us some sauce with onions in it to eat with the pancakes to. As for the taste, it's not an amazing pancake but worth a try!

After buying the pancake, we didn't know which other stall to eat from cause they all look pretty much the same. This ahjumma motioned us to sit at her stall so we simply obliged.

She gave us these dishes after a series of hand gestures and korean which i only managed to understand parts of.  We also had a small bowl of soup each with pieces of fish cakes inside. The kimbap (sushi like thing) was really delicious. Tteokbokki was well, tteokbokki. The soondae (blood sausage), the intestine looking like food, is a bit like glutinous rice with blood. It wasn't as bad as i thought it was. The cold pork knuckle was like one of those cold dishes you get to eat at restaurants.


I'm really bad at describing the taste of food. To me it's just good or bad or sweet or salty or sour or bitter. 



The total cost was 19000KRW for 3 people. From what i understood, the dishes she gave us are the "small" sized ones which we couldn't even finish so I can't imagine her medium or large size platters. The soup should be 2000KRW each.

I really wanted to try the cold noodle and bibimbap but we were really too full from this filling breakfast. I will definitely go back there the next time i visit Seoul to try these two dishes.

Overall, Gwangjang Market is a nice place to visit and walk around just to get a feel of the traditional market.