We've Got Seoul

Well, here we go. We made it to our 1st destination of Bali after traveling for about 32 hours. The flights both went by way quicker than expected. We had a 12.5 hour flight from LAX to Seoul, South Korea followed by a 13 hour layover, and finishing with a 6.5 hour flight to Bali. We were extremely lucky on both flights as our flight to Seoul I requested a bulkhead seat at the airport so we could almost stretch our legs out straight and our flight to Bali I went up and asked for an exit row and we were placed there. I am not sure if we are lucky or if no one on this side of the world will actually go up and ask for this. Either way, we will take it.

After arriving into Incheon International, we made our way through customs and then washed our face, etc in the airport bathroom. With as much stuff as we had leading up to our departure from America, we didn't have time to research what to do in Seoul on a 13 hour layover so we did this at the airport. We took the 50 minute train into Seoul and then transferred to the subway which took us to Gyeongbokgung Palace. This is the main palace in the city and it was definitely a good stop. We were able to catch the changing of the guards just as we were leaving. Also, going to tourist attractions right when they open is the way to go as you miss out on the crowds. Below are some photos from the palace.

We started walking from here and went to one of the street markets called the Insadong Market. The street was lined with various vendors but it was surprisingly very clean. I opted to try one of these bungeoppang which was a pancake filled with something that reminded me of a jam with pecans. It was tasty...I should have had about 12 more. Below is a photo from Insadong. We were there quite early so shops were just opening and the streets weren't busy.

From Insadong, we continued walking to Myeongdong Market. This was the upscale version of their markets. The streets were lined with designers, Nike, Adidas, and many more. There are about 2 Dunkin Donuts per block in Seoul. There is also every kind of American fast food you could ever want plus multiple Outback Steakhouses. This actually surprised me. After walking through the market, we began to search for a place to eat lunch. We knew we had to have something Korean as we were only there for a day. This becomes somewhat difficult when the menus aren't in English and you can't even tell what is in the picture. We walked around the blocks for about 20 minutes before deciding on a Korean BBQ that we saw numerous business people go into. This restaurant was on the second level and it had a 15 minute wait...this was a good sign. The food was very spicy, but very good. We weren't exactly sure what the protocol was to eating it correctly, so we just winged it and no one seemed to be staring at us. SUCCESS! We were glad we made our way into the city rather than just sleeping at the airport.

After a long day of walking, we made our way back to the subway to head to Incheon Airport. Our flight to Bali was alright, quite turbulent just like our flight over to Korea. We left LAX at 11:35pm on Oct 2nd and arrived into Bali at 12am on Oct 5th.

We will post pictures of the place we are staying here in Bali in the next post.

-Drew