Hello! Let’s continue my Day 2 at Korea. On this post I will share my experience touring around the famous attractions in Seoul – the Bukchon Hanok Village, Insadong and N Seoul Tower.
If you haven’t read Part 1, you can click here
South Korea Trip 2016 : Day 2 (Part 2)
After visiting Gyeongbokgung Palace, next, we move to Buckhon Hanok Village. You can walk from Gyeongbokgung Palace, but we took the subway instead.
Buckhon Hanok Village
Direction to Buckhon Hanok Village: by foot from Gyeongbokgung Palace or take subway from Gyeongbokgung to Anguk station Line 3, Exit #2
You can refer to this map where City Hall, Gwanghwamun Square, Gyeongbokgung Palace and Bukchon Hanok Village is nearby each other
You can find a tourist information center when you walk straight after the exit. If you are not sure how to go to the village and the main spot, please have a map in your hand. From the tourist information center, we walked straight 300m and arrived (the ‘starting point’ is on your right, if you come from exit 2).
to Bukchon Hanok Village map
Buckhon Hanok Village is a village where hundreds of traditional Korean houses called Hanok are preserved. It’s like a neighborhood area with beautiful traditional houses. You can rent hanbok around the area but we didn’t. I wish we did because at that time we thought we can rent at other places. Turn out, we didn’t get any chance. These places have 8 highlights look which you don’t want to miss.
Traditional houses on your right and left side
One of the traditional house here
Still continuing our journey, it is still early; we are ahead from our original plan. We only spent two hours at Bukchon Hanok Village. We head to Insadong.
Insadong
Insadong is like a street with row of shops that sells traditional and art stuff, teahouses, cafes and restaurant. There are also shops that sells souvenir with cheap price.
Direction to Insadong: by foot from Buckhon Hanok Village
At one of the junction to Insadong
We stopped by few shops to look for souvenir and I managed to buy something for my family and friends here. Straight ahead of the street there’s Ssamziegil building. This building has a unique area where it has spiral-like stairway with shops on each floor. At this time we are hungry so we just look around the building.
Insadong main street
Ssamziegel
You can refer to this map
We didn’t actually plan to eat at Insadong. So now comes the time where we need to search for halal food using the free wi-fi as we didn’t have any pocket wi-fi or olleh wi-fi. Macam orang lost kot sebab lapar dah. After certain amount of time jalan jalan sambil guna google maps, jumpa pun tempat makan.
Indoro Indian Cuisine
This is Indoro Restaurant. They serve indian food, buffet style at only 13,000 won per head. You can eat all you want sampai kenyang. I was like seriously, tak pernah pernah suka makan indian food tiba tiba jadi sedap. Food is fully recommended. I don’t remember what I ate but they have curry, fried chicken, vegetable soup, nan and other Indian food.
Indoro Restaurant
Address: 20, Insadong 5-gil, Jongno-gu | Gwanhun-Dong, Owon Bldg. 2F, Seoul 110-300, South Korea
Every junction/street at Insadong have their signage, so you won’t missed this street to this restaurant. Just walk straight from the Ssamziegil until you find street no 20, it was on the right side, so make a turn and walk straight till you find this restaurant.
After that, so full okay. We walked back to the subway station. One more interest thing they sell at Insadong street is Kkultarae (a.k.a kuih rambut nenek? Haha). You can see they are few shops selling this. They will let you watch them make the kuih. This kkultarae also known as Korean court cake, is a type of Korean dessert made with honey and maltose, as well as various fillings. You can eat it like that or keep it frozen. Taste die sedap sedap je, makan sekali tak cukup, so boleh la nak bawak balik Malaysia sebab tahan lama.
Namsan Tower
Next, we move to the next location – Namsan Tower; the place where you can view the entire Seoul because it is located up hill. I never realized how far it is or I mean how high it is, but when we are walking towards the cable car, wallawei so high, nak menapak gi cable car pun penat. So if you plan to walk to the tower, please make sure you still have 100% energy.
Nah tengokla kena mendaki
At the end of the walkaway, take this elevator to the cable car
Direction to Namsan Tower: take subway to Myeondeong station Line 4 Exit #3.
To be honest we are lost here. I don’t remember which way we go but we managed to reach the elevator to take the cable car. I only remember we walk straight from the exit, then there’s a junction, we turn left. From here we walk straight (and uphill), till there’s an underground walkaway to cross to the other side of the road. Walk uphill again till you can see the cable car.
We paid 8,500 won for the cable car. And we reached! The tower is so pretty from far but as go nearer I didn’t feel the enthusiasm anymore because my leg was in pain. So all of us just sat somewhere near the tower. We supposed to wait till night for the tower to light up but we went back at 6.00pm and head to somewhere else. But since all of us tired, hmm we straight go to our guesthouse and have a rest.
View from the cable car station
The famous place
- There’s nothing much to do here, just sit around the corner and wait till night for the tower to light up
That’s how my day 2 end. Hope you enjoy reading. If you want to get the PDF copy of the maps, you can email me. Last but not least, here is my Day 2 expenses.
That’s all I spend in Day 2 not including souvenirs I bought at Insadong. The souvenir I bought was 10 pieces of fridge magnet (I bought 2 sets of this) at 7,000 won , 10 pairs of nail clippers at 7,000 won.
If you have any enquiry you can drop an email at atheeradayana@gmail.com
Thank you for reading again!
