Seoul, the capital of South Korea is a unique city. Spread over a large area it combines modern with ancient architectures.
Since Seoul is only 1 hour from Dalian by flight, we decided to take a weekend tour there (in April 2019, looking back with a little nostalgia how easy and common international travel was before COVID).
We did not really make any planning, just wanted to see some main sights. It turns out there is not „the main spot“ where you „have to“ go, there are many interesting areas.
Hotel – Grand Ambassador Seoul
It turns out hotels in Seoul can be crazy expensive. So we tried to find a „reasonable“ 5-star hotel which does not cost 250€+ per night. It turned out the „Grand Ambassador associated with Pullman“ had a quite good location (10 minutes to next subway station, near Seoul tower) and was „affordable“. Anyhow, the hotel turned out great and the breakfast alone was worth the price.
Tour overview
We had totally 4 days for our trip (Friday – Monday)
- Day 1: Arrival and Nightlife
- Day 2: Changdeokgung Palace and Trickeye Museum
- Day 3: Lotte World
- Day 4: Gyeongbokgung Palace and return flight
Changdeokgung Palace
This is a 600 year old UNESCO World Heritage City and one of the jewels of the city. The area is really huge (we spent at least 3 hours only walking) and includes many gardens and areas with smaller buildings.
Nightlife
There is of course also probably any activity you can do at night. We went to some bars, an outdoor market and just strolling through the touristy streets. You can find everything for every taste.
Gyeongbokgung Palace
Not much to say about this huge palace installment. It has a top rating of „must see“ on TripAdvisor. It is also the largest palace in Seoul.
Lotte world
Lotte is a huge company, wich is into real estate and shopping malls (probably much else). There is a whole district, called Lotte World, with a distinct skyscraper, a nice lake and kind of an amusement park (not to forget countless shops).
As it was just the time of cherry blossom season, you can imagine how many people were there (many). You even had to wait in line to take a picture at the best spots.
Trickeye Museum
Near the Lotte world we found a nice „AR (augmented reality)“ trickeye museum. It was really fun and you should definitely give it a visit.
First, there are several wall pictures with optical illusions where you can take some crazy pictures.
Second, and that’s probably the cooler thing, you can download an APP on your phone and at certain spots your phone adds stuff to the pictures you take there. So for example, there is a static picture with a volcano bursting in the background. The APP then adds falling lava, smoke and other things into the picture and you can take a video of it. In another spot you could lay on the ground and on the phone it looked like a shark is eating you. Or you could sit on a model horse and the APP adds wings to it so it looks like a winged unicorn.
Banpodaegyo Bridge
It doesn’t look like much, but it is totally worth going to this bridge at night. There is a huge lawn where people have small tents and just enjoy themselves. The bridge itself is illuminated and there are water „fountains“ that look colorful in different lights. I posted a video as well, but it looks much better in reality.
A little further down the „beach“ we found something like a gaming arcade hall. It was huge fun shooting spiders with some plastic guns!
Further Impressions
I hope by below collection of impressions we can give you some ideas about what’s Seoul like. There were cool and busy streets, things we have never seen before, like a backpack for your cat (which is worn on the front, not on the back, no idea if it is called frontpack).
We are really thrilled to come back! Since Korea is our very close neighbor, as soon as COVID is gone, we will be back for more of this wonderful city and country!
2GIC 