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Seoul, Korea (June, 2014) – Day Five: Edae + Flight Back Home

July 4, 2015

Our flight back home was scheduled in the evening, and we decided to do some last-minute shopping during our last few hours in Korea. Instead of going back to shop in Dongdaemun, we decided to check out Edae.

Although, the day before, we set out to go shopping at Dongdaemun, which is known as Seoul’s main shopping district, we found that the shopping experience there wasn’t quite what we were expecting. With further research the night of the day we went to Dongdaemun, we found out that Edae was actually a better place to visit. The shopping streets along Edae are known to sell products similar to the ones in Dongdaemun, but for a cheaper price. This is mainly because their target market is the students from the nearby women’s university; thus, setting the prices cheaper for a younger market. If you will are looking to go shopping for cheap(er) women’s clothing, I highly suggest you also visit Edae (apart from Myeong-dong).

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korea seoul travel

Seoul, Korea (June, 2014) – Day Four: Dongdaemun + Insa-dong + Hongdae

July 3, 2015

We wanted our second to the last day to be a more laid-back day, since we didn’t want to stress out the night before our flight. Well, in the case of half of my family, their flight was scheduled earlier, i.e. the night of the fourth day, so the more we wanted to give them the freedom to what they wanted to do on their last day in Korea. However, we decided to have Dongdaemun as a fixed schedule during the morning, then it was up to us how we wanted to spend the rest of the day.

We got to visit Zaha Hadid’s famous Dongdaemun Plaza design!

Towards the afternoon, we accompanied those who missed out Insa-dong on the previous day/s to the aforementioned location once again. We wanted them to get at least a feel of what the traditional souvenir area had to offer!

Towards the evening, half of my family had already left for their earlier flight. As for the rest of us, we decided to head to Hongdae for dinner, while my sister separated to meet up with her friend in Gangnam.

Originally, we scheduled to meet up with Korean locals to tour us around Hongdae, but had problems with reaching them once we’ve arrived in the area, so ended up being late due to lack of means of communication. And because of that, we decided to spontaneously change our plans and just have dinner and try out the famous chicken and beer combo in Korea for our dinner that night!

Dinner, dessert, and street performers you can commonly find in Hongdae during the evening.

korea seoul travel

Seoul, Korea (June, 2014) – Day Three: Everland

July 2, 2015

I didn’t get to take much photos during the third day since we spent the entire day in Everland. And because of that, I didn’t want to be bringing my bulky DSLR around, so I stuck to taking photos with my mobile phone. I apologize in advance that the photos I took aren’t of high quality since I spent a lot of time moving around and trying to enjoy the theme park. It was a day that went by pretty fast and in a blur, so the photos I took of that day were pretty much in a random mix-up as well. Continue Reading

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Seoul, Korea (June, 2014) – Day Two: Gyeongbokgung Palace + Samcheong-dong + Bukchon Hanok Village + N Seoul Tower

May 10, 2015

For this day, we set out focusing to experience more of the traditional and cultural side of Korea. Luckily enough, the hotel we booked was located within the vicinity (Jongno-gu) of the most-visited traditional palace in Korea, i.e. the Gyeongbokgung Palace.

The Gyeongbokgung Palace has existed for over 600 years and also remains as the largest palace in the region. We were lucky enough to visit the palace during the last Wednesday of the month–it turns out that every last Wednesday of the month is free admission day! Continue Reading

korea seoul travel

Seoul, Korea (June, 2014) – Day One: Hongdae

October 6, 2014

We decided to cap off the day by having our dinner in a good old Korean BBQ restaurant in Hongdae (which is also an abbreviation for Hongik University). Since it’s in the vicinity of the school, you’ll be sure to see much of the youth around the area. Apart from that, Hongdae has also become the ‘go-to’ place for young street performers who aspire to be discovered and become professional artists of their own specialty one day.

(P.S. Please forgive me for the photo quality, since I was only able to use my mobile phone to snap photos during the part of the trip!) Continue Reading

korea seoul travel

Seoul, Korea (June, 2014) – Day One: Cheonggyecheon Stream + Myeongdong

September 7, 2014

After the quiet and peaceful stroll along the traditional streets of Insa-dong, we decided it was time to take a glimpse of what the hustling and bustling city life of Korea was all about. We had Myeong-dong, the famous shopping strip, listed as our next destination in our itinerary. And as we were still adjusting to the lifestyle of Koreans in relation to public transportation, it was another tiring walk for us from our current spot to the nearest subway station. We still had much of the day ahead of us! Continue Reading

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Seoul, Korea (June, 2014) – Day One: Arrival + Insa-dong

July 4, 2014

I noticed that I haven’t posted anything in a while. It has honestly been quite busy the past few weeks since a lot of preparations were going on for our trip to Korea. Now recently back from the trip, I am glad to say that I have a ton of things to share with you guys about it!

(By the way, since this will definitely end up being a photo-heavy post, I’ve decided to break down my blog posts by making separate blog posts regarding highlighting events/locations of the trip per day. I’ll eventually be including links to other related blog entries once I’ve completed all of them.)

Our trip was scheduled for five days and four nights on the month of June, which is within the summer season of Korea. We did our research beforehand, and were pleased to find out that the expected climate was very much in our favor, since it was around 23°C (similar to Tagaytay in the Philippines) during most of the days of our stay, as compared to the typical scorching 29°-31°C here during the summer in the Philippines. It was also indicated that it was mostly going to be cloudy, with barely any intense heat from the sun.

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