In the morning, we headed out to the Yongsan Elecctronics Market in Seoul.   It wasn’t really what I expected.  It is a collection of 20 buildings, and it wasn’t always clear how to get from one to the other.  The first building we went into was about 6 stories high (I’Park Mall), and is in ... (read more →)

We took the high speed train back to Seoul from Daegu. The train goes up to 300 km/h in sections, and was a very convenient way of crossing the country.  It cost us about $40 US per ticket. We got seats in advance, and the train left exactly on time and there was lots of ... (read more →)

Since it was our anniversary, we decided to go up the N’Seoul Tower to celebrate.  To get to the base of the tower you take a cable car, which provides you with great views too.  Once inside you take an elevator up to the observation deck with huge windows giving you great views out over ... (read more →)

 
We made not one, but 2 trips to Namdaemun Market – it’s that big.  Of course, it’s Korea, so it’s well organized with info booths with English speakers.  They have maps available, with bathrooms and banks clearly marked and all the buildings labeled and what they sell listed. 
 
There is a large wholesale market with approximately ... (read more →)

From Busan we traveled to Daegu.  From there it was easy to get to Haeinsa Temple by bus.  Daegu also had a huge market - Seomun – which seems to sell a ton of different food, mostly.  It was great for people watching and strolling.
There’s also a great downtown area which was really alive at night.  We ... (read more →)

 
Daegu is a convenient base to head out to yet another amazing temple – Haeinsa Temple.  There are buses everywhere in Korea, and they all run on time, all the time, and are impeccably clean.  Amazing. The road is windy and steep, and so it took an hour an a half to get there.  It was well worth ... (read more →)

The subway system in Busan is like all the others we used in Korea – fabulous.  The trains run very frequently and the stations are well organized, announced in English (and Korean, and Chinese, and Japanese) and everything is, of course, spotlessly clean.  Naturally.
Notice the arrows on the yellow strip at the edge of the ... (read more →)

From Gyeongju we traveled to Busan, a bustling port in the south of the country with plenty of US sailors everywhere – the USS Reagan had just docked, with 5,000 sailors on shore leave!  Plus there were other USS ships in port at the same time.
We had an amazing hotel room for $30 US (or 2 ... (read more →)

We stayed at the Goodmorning Haotel Motel, which was possibly the best value hotel we’ve ever gotten of all 51 countries we’ve travelled to. For $30 we got an exceptionally clean room, big tv, nice towels, bathrobes, huge shower with floor to ceiling glass windows to the main room – all the toileteries we could ... (read more →)

We stayed at Sarangchae Home Stay. We stayed in a tradiditional ondol-style room – basically this means the small room had a thin mattress on the floor, a fan, and nothing else.  Just a 30 foot walk from our room, the shared shower facility was clean, but very very small with nowhere to ... (read more →)