I hoped to get close to six hours of sleep overnight but it ended up more like half that. Some new people must have checked in because there was doors slamming until like 1:00am and loud conversations going on in the hallway. In addition to that I think I'm starting to come down with a fever, so I was still exhausted when 5:00am came along and I just hoped to have enough mental capacity to make it to the airport for a flight to South Korea.
A short timeline of the morning:
The Korean Air guy at the check-in counter was helpful, he said only middle seats were available but because I was tall - or taller than most on board - I got the spacious emergency exit row. We were stuck on the runway for about half an hour but still managed to arrive on time, so they must put a lot of padding in their flight times.
I converted my remaining Chinese money into Korean "won" and got 49,000 worth - those numbers are crazy, the exchange rate to Australian is like 1 to 950. I also got another 200,000 won from the ATM, the largest denomination is only 10,000 or about $10 which is a bit silly. Incheon Airport was pretty fantastic, everything was clean, white and shiny and they even had a movie cinema !
I splashed out for the express train direct to Seoul which cost all of about $8 and took 45 minutes, I'm not sure how much cheaper the stopping all stations train could be that you would take it instead. The Seoul railway station was again really confusing, the express train was down in like Basement Level 6 and the subway was all the way up at street level, out of the building, and down a few more escalators. If I thought that was confusing, buying a subway ticket was even worse. Since I had all my luggage to deal with I was just going to buy a single trip ticket, as I only had to go to the very next station on the line, but when I pressed that button on the machine it said you needed to have a special 1150 won note, plus a 500 won deposit. What the hell is a 1150 won note !?
So I advanced my travel plans and went into the convenience store nearby to buy a T-Money card - again it's a card that is better than Myki simply by existence. The card cost 2500 won at the store, but they don't give you any credit and can't reload it for you, so it was back to the station machines to load some credit on it. With that finally taken care of I just had to get down to the subway, only they have those stupid turnstile gates where it is absolutely impossible to get through with a suitcase ! I was already starting to feel a bit run down as this fever was taking over, but I just managed to lob my suitcase over the turnstiles and then hoped that my card allowed me through to collect it, which thankfully it did.
The train trip took an entire two minutes and I was out again, and I emerged in the middle of a crazy market. I knew my hotel was close to a market but it didn't realise the market would be absolutely everywhere. I had a poor quality Google Map which only had a few main streets on it, but there weren't many street signs around and all the street names were almost identical anyway, such as:
Some of them ran north-south, some east-west and some in other various directions, it made no sense at all and didn't seem to run in numerical order like you would expect. I was feeling pretty crap by now, it was pretty hot outside without a hat or sunscreen, and I was trying to roll my suitcase through the market and around people who didn't want to move out of the way - it felt like forever but was more like 20-30 minutes until that magical moment arrived that I found the hotel. Once I'd arrived it all seemed so easy, but it was a hell of a time trying to track it down.
After I had checked-in I had a headache coming on too, so I just had to rest for an hour as I had no energy at all. I came up with a small plan so that the afternoon would not be wasted - I walked over to the Myeong-dong district. I saw some interesting snack vendors - one was selling what looked like french fries mashed together on a stick, and another was selling an ice-cream that was over a foot long. I spotted N Seoul Tower in the distance, but it was a bit too far to go there today. I got a drink from the Smoothie King store and hoped it might help settle down my sickness a little, but it didn't make much difference.
I got as far as Myeong-dong Cathedral through the crowded streets then took a different route back to explore a little more of the surrounding area. I had a look for something for dinner that I thought I might be able to handle eating, but nothing really matched with my current physical state. I ended up a little bit past the hotel in the opposite direction at Sungnyemun Gate before deciding to call it a day, I just got some bakery items, snacks and drinks to get me through until the return of free breakfasts in the morning !
When I got back to the hotel I found the Australia Channel on TV ! Basically the channel is total garbage, except is has all of the weekly AFL games and by luck Carlton vs. Geelong was about to start. I feel asleep several times during the game and I knew Carlton were going to just lose in the end, but it was still a pleasant discovery. I went to bed about 7:00pm with the hope I wouldn't be as sick in the morning.
My other opinions of the hotel:
A short timeline of the morning:
- 5:00am check-out of hotel and get 1000 RMB deposit refunded on credit card
- 5:10am got to the subway, first person on the platform !
- 5:30am first train departed
- 5:40am change trains and wait for the next line to begin
- 6:00am second train departed towards the airport
- 6:30am change platform and train, but remain on the same train line, for some reason
- 7:10am arrive at airport
- 7:40am finished check-in and security
- 8:10am boarded plane for Seoul
The Korean Air guy at the check-in counter was helpful, he said only middle seats were available but because I was tall - or taller than most on board - I got the spacious emergency exit row. We were stuck on the runway for about half an hour but still managed to arrive on time, so they must put a lot of padding in their flight times.
I converted my remaining Chinese money into Korean "won" and got 49,000 worth - those numbers are crazy, the exchange rate to Australian is like 1 to 950. I also got another 200,000 won from the ATM, the largest denomination is only 10,000 or about $10 which is a bit silly. Incheon Airport was pretty fantastic, everything was clean, white and shiny and they even had a movie cinema !
 |
| Airport cinema. |
I splashed out for the express train direct to Seoul which cost all of about $8 and took 45 minutes, I'm not sure how much cheaper the stopping all stations train could be that you would take it instead. The Seoul railway station was again really confusing, the express train was down in like Basement Level 6 and the subway was all the way up at street level, out of the building, and down a few more escalators. If I thought that was confusing, buying a subway ticket was even worse. Since I had all my luggage to deal with I was just going to buy a single trip ticket, as I only had to go to the very next station on the line, but when I pressed that button on the machine it said you needed to have a special 1150 won note, plus a 500 won deposit. What the hell is a 1150 won note !?
So I advanced my travel plans and went into the convenience store nearby to buy a T-Money card - again it's a card that is better than Myki simply by existence. The card cost 2500 won at the store, but they don't give you any credit and can't reload it for you, so it was back to the station machines to load some credit on it. With that finally taken care of I just had to get down to the subway, only they have those stupid turnstile gates where it is absolutely impossible to get through with a suitcase ! I was already starting to feel a bit run down as this fever was taking over, but I just managed to lob my suitcase over the turnstiles and then hoped that my card allowed me through to collect it, which thankfully it did.
The train trip took an entire two minutes and I was out again, and I emerged in the middle of a crazy market. I knew my hotel was close to a market but it didn't realise the market would be absolutely everywhere. I had a poor quality Google Map which only had a few main streets on it, but there weren't many street signs around and all the street names were almost identical anyway, such as:
- Namdaemunsijang-gil
- Namdaemunsijang 4-gil
- Namdaemunsijang 6-gil
Some of them ran north-south, some east-west and some in other various directions, it made no sense at all and didn't seem to run in numerical order like you would expect. I was feeling pretty crap by now, it was pretty hot outside without a hat or sunscreen, and I was trying to roll my suitcase through the market and around people who didn't want to move out of the way - it felt like forever but was more like 20-30 minutes until that magical moment arrived that I found the hotel. Once I'd arrived it all seemed so easy, but it was a hell of a time trying to track it down.
After I had checked-in I had a headache coming on too, so I just had to rest for an hour as I had no energy at all. I came up with a small plan so that the afternoon would not be wasted - I walked over to the Myeong-dong district. I saw some interesting snack vendors - one was selling what looked like french fries mashed together on a stick, and another was selling an ice-cream that was over a foot long. I spotted N Seoul Tower in the distance, but it was a bit too far to go there today. I got a drink from the Smoothie King store and hoped it might help settle down my sickness a little, but it didn't make much difference.
 |
| I wish I knew why there was some many people around on a Friday afternoon. |
I got as far as Myeong-dong Cathedral through the crowded streets then took a different route back to explore a little more of the surrounding area. I had a look for something for dinner that I thought I might be able to handle eating, but nothing really matched with my current physical state. I ended up a little bit past the hotel in the opposite direction at Sungnyemun Gate before deciding to call it a day, I just got some bakery items, snacks and drinks to get me through until the return of free breakfasts in the morning !
 |
| Myeong-dong Cathedral (foreground) and N Seoul Tower (background). |
 |
| If you reach Sungnyemun Gate, you've gone too far. |
When I got back to the hotel I found the Australia Channel on TV ! Basically the channel is total garbage, except is has all of the weekly AFL games and by luck Carlton vs. Geelong was about to start. I feel asleep several times during the game and I knew Carlton were going to just lose in the end, but it was still a pleasant discovery. I went to bed about 7:00pm with the hope I wouldn't be as sick in the morning.
My other opinions of the hotel:
- The room is tiny !
- No welcome guide to explain anything about the room or hotel facilities
- No shampoo provided !?
- Crazy Japanese style toilet with a whole control panel in Korean
- The people at reception could speak almost no English at all
- At least there are free breakfasts
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