SOOOOOOOO! Without much further ado, let me present to you my South Korea, Seoul tripping travel diary! I have divided them into two parts. Part I - Jeonju and Naejangsan and Part II - Seoul to make for easier referencing. :D
Travel Date: 2nd - 9th November 2016
Travel Destinations: Seoul > Jeonju > Naejangsan > Seoul
Expenditure: SGD $602 per person (SCOOT flight including 30kg baggage) Approx SGD $1400 for 2 (Inclusive of transportation fees, food, souvenirs) SGD $50 per night for 2 for Seoul accomodation (Jeonju accomodation was about SGD $65 per night approx)
WI-FI: Found in plenty of cafes! I relied on Darren (my travel buddy!) as my personal hotspot as he had to be on his company phone frequently throughout this period of travel. Alternatively, you can just get either a WI-FI egg rental or get a SIM card at the Airport
Weather: Autumn approaching start of Winter. Temperatures range from as high as 18 degrees to as low as -2 degrees. :O
Navigation: Google Maps mostly. However, I have seen online reviews and some use Naver. I feel Google Maps works fine for me.
*Disclaimer: This is not an official travel guide so opinions, reviews and instructions are subjected to biases, memory lapses and the occasional side-track rambling.*
J E O N J U
Darren and I arrived late at night in Seoul on the first day. We checked-in to our guesthouse for the night and headed for Jeonju first thing in the morning the next day. We packed a day bag as we were only heading outside of Seoul and staying at Jeonju for a night and left our luggage at the guesthouse we were planning to stay for the remaining days of the trip.
Took an approximately 3.5-hour train ride to Jeonju (:
KORAIL has 2 trains that head to Jeonju from Seoul (Yongsan station), one is KTX (Express) and the other is Mugunghwa (Non-Express). We booked the latter as it was cheaper -> 17 600 KRW for assigned seats for 1 adult; 15 000 KRW for non-assigned/standing for 1 adult. If you wanna scrimp on money, you can take the non-assigned seats and if you are lucky, you might be able to grab a seat. However, if someone else along the way gets on and has booked that seat, chances are you might have to stand for the remaining hours of the journey. As the journey is pretty long, it might be more prudent to make your journey more comfortable and booked an assigned seat. The difference is only about SGD $2-3 only! KTX (Express) takes approx 1.5 hours to reach Jeonju but the cost for a standard/assigned Economy seat per adult -> 34 400 KRW, which is almost twice the cost of a Non-Express train ride. :O
My obsession with trains and railway tracks has not died yet since Japan trip eheh :D
Just outside the train station, we walked out to queue up for a bus to head to our accommodation location which is located near Jeonju Hanok Village. Photo above is what you can see when you turn to your right (Took it while we were queuing up while I was bored haha)
Entrance to our traditional guesthouse
Wrote our own wishes on stars and attached it to the heart-shaped structure already filled with so much love from many all around the world! :O
Our traditional guesthouse stay at Jeonju! (: We slept on the floor with futon and stiff pillows (more like wooden blocks actually; maybe its just our guesthouse or maybe even more specifically, my room). Not very comfortable, to be honest but the blankets/pullovers were soft and we were cosy. For just one night to experience a traditional homestay, I'm pretty satisfied. :D We stayed at Happiness Full Hanok Guesthouse Jeonju, if you are wondering. It has free-WI-FI, a public pantry with microwave oven and private bathroom. The huge plus for this accommodation is its location as it is just a few minutes walk away from Hanok Village.
PLACES WE WENT:
1. Jeonju Hanok Village
Hanbok (Traditional Korean costume) Dressing Up
When it was approaching evening time, the crowd starts to thin out. This was about 4pm in the evening. Still gorgeous with the nightlights :O
Yep, the Streets of Jeonju!
With such traditional and quaint-looking village houses, it is no wonder dressing up in traditional Korean costume aka Hanbok is so popular here! Both locals and tourists LOVE to do that in this area! The price we paid is about 15000KRW/hr per person. It is a pretty reasonable price, compared to the dressing up in Kimonos and Yukata with my friends back in Japan (Japan itinerary here) We did not follow any recommendations online and simply just popped by a store, asked the price, chose the design, placed our bags in a given locker and the ladies there helped us to get ready. The price package includes small purse, costume and simple hair braid (girls) top only (guys). Honestly speaking, I'm not too sure if the simple hair braid was included because I was standing at the counter waiting for Darren to finish dressing up and the lady just grabbed my shoulder, sat me down in front of the mirror and started braiding my hair. And I was like 'Oh...okay...'. I guess you can ask? We didn't compare shops or anything but I saw some girls on the streets having their hair up in a simple low ponytail and I was just thinking, 'YAY! I have a braid!'
Anyhoooo, I probably might do a Hanbok VS Kimono experience/review so stay tuned ;)
Additionally, I also noticed that the Koreans who visit Jeonju tend to be young couples or youths with their group of friends. There were plenty of youths around that area so Jeonju, despite its associations with it being 'traditional', seems to be quite an in-thing. Many of them, like us, come here for a day and either leave on the same day or stay for just one night. All in all, Jeonju is really a great place to visit for an entire day. :)
The lady at the shop who helped me into the Hanbok also helped me to braid my hair. If you want extra accessories in your hair, it is possible but at an extra cost!
Fun story; A lot of elderly Koreans were there as well and exploring the Village. Plenty of them came up to me, thinking I'm Korean and started speaking to me in Korean. One of them even (brazenly) took a photo of me while Darren was taking photos for me in my Hanbok like WUT. Although I'm quite flattered, but ummm.... still quite creepy.
(P.s Considering I took a photo of two young children in cute Hanbok costumers, as seen a few photos further down below, who am I to judge others hahahaha *sheepish smile* But in my defence, I did it secretly unlike the grandpa!)
Awkward posing hahahah. Darren only rented the top. If you notice in the first picture, his jeans was dark-coloured so it didn't contradict his top drastically. To be honest, we weren't sure if there was a matching bottoms per say. The ladies at the store didn't provide him with that option but we saw some couples on the streets where the guy had full-on headgear, pants and everything and we believe that's gotta be more expensive!!
Upon reflection, I really believe we happened to chance upon the most budgeted of budget costume shops in this area of Jeonju by accident because the ladies at the store didn't try to 'over-sell' us by forcing us to get this accessory, that overcoat etc etc. It was basically renting the bare minimal to us. On a side note though, they were pretty pushy with costume selection. They kept insisting I wore the costume (yes, I eventually did cave in to their insistence), claiming that the costume was 'sexy'. LOL I can't exactly imagine how Hanbok can be 'sexy' because it covers everything - though I believe the word they were going for is 'stylish' or 'hip' or 'trendy'. Ya know what I mean eheh :D However, I have no regrets because I turned many heads with this costume eheh (okay, I'm just kidding!) Moral of the story: Listen to the ahjummas (Korean word for 'aunties') at the store! They know their stuff! (Or at least the ones at my store does hahahaa) Also, some of you may be wondering whether it feels cold or warm wearing the Hanbok. My opinion is that for the current temperature on that day (14 degrees), the Hanbok was fine without having to wear a short fur overcoat (You can rent those as well!) The Hanbok consists of 2 layers, but when I wore mines, I wore a long-sleeved dress underneath as the lady said I need not take that out. So that's about 3 layers (2 layers for Darren).
This is what I meant when I said short fur overcoat. Anyway, took this picture because Hanbok is for EVERYBODY! Kids look adorable in these so I had to snap a picture of them! :D (Hey, I'm not creepy to take photos of young children okay!)
From my IG! Yes, we spam pictures everywhere! The small purse that I'm holding in this picture is also part of the package! Lastly, Hanbok costume wearing is popular in Korea so Jeonju isn't the only place where you can wear one. There are plenty of places back in Seoul such as Bakchon Hanok Village (if you are intending to only go Seoul and I dunno, I have never been to Bakchon, I just Googled and this was the first place that pops up in the browser hah) to try wearing Hanbok :D
HANBOK TIP:
Rent Hanbok costumes that have 'poofed up' skirts. It may not seem like much but when I was back in Seoul, I saw some ladies wearing Hanbok and the skirts were flat which wasn't very flattering. Therefore, make sure to look for those with wire skirts underneath, it makes your costume look more elegant and gorgeous to take photos in!
See how it is 'puffed up'? Sorry, can't think of a better word to describe the skirts. But ya know what I mean. ;)
Selfiesssss <3
2. Jeondong Catholic Cathedral
Gorgeous cathedral that we happened to pass by! According to the brochure given to us by our host from the guesthouse, it is one of the most beautiful cathedrals in Korea and it is the very location that they filmed the movie 'Promise and the Taoist Wizard'. The oldest and biggest architecture among Western modern architecture in Honam region, it is also one of the top three churches in Korea along with Myeongdong Church of Seoul and Gyesan Church of Daegu. (Got the info all from the brochure :D)
We happened to pass by a protest demonstration along the way. Of course they were speaking in Korean and of course, I have absolutely no idea what they were shouting and protesting about but I'm guessing it was related to the then-hubbarb concerning their President and her scandals regarding her administration.
FOOD WE ATE:
1. Street food - Yoghurt/Milk bar (Not too sure but there's a cow sign so...)
As much as I like to have Yoghurt. This Yoghurt-flavoured thingy was NOT something I'm into. Or maybe I just tried a wrong flavour as there were plenty of other flavours. Let me know if ya know what this is in the Comments section below! :D
2. Street food - Fried food with drink (Dunno what it is as well LOL)
There wasn't any English words to this nor were there any like brand names in Romanised Korean so... pictures are the best I can do. Basically they just look like drinks with chips/fries, meat and/or potatoes. Wanted to order one to try but the Korean staff were ignoring us - or maybe they were just too busy cooking. We couldn't understand any signs so whatever... we decided to stop queuing and get other street food instead.
3. Street food - Squid on a stick
They were directly opposite Food item No.2 (Which we didn't even eat LOL) and we went to get that instead. The grilled squid was good! :P
4. Street food - Grapefruit Beer by Espresso of Street
LOL the stall owner asked for Darren's IC in order for him to drink this. Dunno what is the age limit but probably 18 years old due to the alcoholic content. He showed him his driver's license. Darren described the taste to be like a Makgeolli frozen slushie LOL.
5. Street food - Croquette
The croquette is YUMMY! The shop has multiple flavours ranging from curry to ordinary potato. There is a microwave oven near the cashier counter so you can heat it for 30 seconds to 1 minute by yourself and sit there to eat or you can simply do takeaways.
6. Street food - Shuijiao (Wrapped dumplings with fillings of meat/prawn)
We ordered this and sat inside the shop to eat. It tasted like Otah to be honest. But it was good! After which, we decided to do takeaways for the Shuijiao to have for breakfast in the morning the next day. The Shuijiao turned out to be really good after heated!
Actually, in this cold weather where it can drop to minus 2 degrees in the night, every warm/hot/heated up food is great for the belly hahhaa :D
7. Street food - PNB Chocolate pie
PNB traditional Chocolate ('Choco' for short) pie is a little dry but holds the chocolate flavour pretty decently. There are a few stores selling chocolate pies and only the one shown in my pictures above is the authentic and supposedly the most popular one. We didn't buy any because we weren't fervent chocolate lovers. Of course, there are those packaged Choco pie in boxes back at Lotte Mart in Seoul that you can buy back home but here in Jeonju, they are pretty famous for this. My advice is to buy one to try first and if you really like it, then get a box of 6 or more to bring back home (:
8. Street food - Makgeolli
Okay so this isn't a 'street food' per say, but I'm just gonna classify it under this category since we didnt drink this in a restaurant. Darren tried the one at the top shelf (full yellow label) and he said it wasn't nice. I believe it is a Jeonju specialty Makgeolli.
9. Street food - Egglet by Waffpang
I chose the honey and chopped nuts flavour! It was really good! Though this cost about SGD $5-7 which is a pretty hefty price for street food in my opinion.
10. Korean Restaurant
This is the restaurant name in Korean.
Yes, we came back here in our Hanbok to take photos LOL.
Getting here:
As mentioned at the start of this post, we took a 3.5-hour train ride from Seoul to Jeonju and walked around the Hanok Village the remaining parts of the day. There are buses/taxis around that can take you to other tourist sites in Jeonju if you would like.
Advice:
1-2 days to visit Jeonju should be sufficient. As we arrived around noon, we only had about half a day to explore Jeonju and hence, only stayed around the Hanok Village. If you are keen to explore other areas, you should dedicate more hours or even an extra day so that you can visit more places. Few other places besides Hanok Village that are worthy to visit are:
1. Jeonjubuseong Fortress and Old Street (Along this stretch, Dongmun Art street is a vibrant cultural space housing theatres and book stores)
2. Omodae/Imokdae (I dunno; the pictures in the brochure and this website look pretty hahaha - An open landscape to view the Hanok Village all at once.)
3. Nambu Market 2nd floor Youth Mall 'Real New-Town' (Small and cute place with sellers in their 20s and 30s selling innovative items - as quoted from the brochure hahaa)
4. Nambu Night Market (Special event ONLY open during Fridays and Saturdays - We didn't manage to catch this, sadly as we were in Jeonju during the weekdays)
5. Dokkaebi Market (A market which only opens for 3 hours from 5am everyday. Selling quirky items - as quoted frm the brochure hahaa)
There are also plenty of festivals as seen here:
Travel periods recommended are between May to October.
Travel periods recommended are between May to October.
Lastly, a Korea tripping wouldn't be complete without a Hanbok experience! Highly recommended so give it a go! (:
N A E J A N G S A N (内藏山)
After Jeonju, we went to Naejangsan in the hopes of catching the Autumn scenery atop a mountain. We rented a car from Lotte Car Rental here. Naejangsan isn't a very accessible place to reach. There are no direct trains/buses from Jeonju or Seoul, for that matter, and hence, we decided to rent a car for the day and drive there. Rental is about SGD $100 per day. Please get your international license before the trip as you need to present it before you can get the car. The rental service has plenty of locations where you can pick up or drop off your car and we chose to pick up the car from Jeonju and drop off back at the same place and thereafter, take a bus back to Seoul. Alternatively, you can also drop the car off at Seoul but that would mean at least 4 hours of car ride from Naejangsan to Seoul. Apart from the long car ride, we decided against that as well because we weren't sure how long we would take at Naejangsan and whether we could reach back (if we chose Seoul) by the alloted time that we chose as we need to factor in 'getting lost' and possible traffic jams along the way. We didn't wanna stress ourselves over making it back to Seoul in time and hence, decided to return the car back to Jeonju which is about an hour ride from Naejangsan.
Yes, they provide a Navigation device ( I believe it is powered by Naver?) in English. Google Maps aren't very good at navigating outside of Seoul, according to our experience. Also, the staff at the rental service helped us to type both Naejangsan and the location of the Car Rental place into the device so that we need not fret about entering the wrong address and worry about getting lost! Thankfully! :D
Lastly, yes, you need to pay road tolls. We didn't know we had to (and the car rental services didn't inform us either -.- Okay, they probably just assumed we knew) until we were fast approaching the gantries on the expressway and started panicking. "What is this?!" "What do we need to do?" "Which lane do we go to???" "I CAN'T UNDERSTAND KOREAN!"
Yeah.. that was pretty much what went on between us in the car at that moment.
Yeah.. that was pretty much what went on between us in the car at that moment.
So to prevent similar nail-biting experience, here's some personal pointers for you:
1. If you are heading from Jeonju > Naejangsan, it is a 1-hour car ride and there are 2 gantries. One to collect ticket and the next one to make payment.
2. Collection of ticket: Head to the lane with manual collection. Not sure which? Slow down and check out the cars in front of you. The car drivers who stop to put their hands out to press a button; go to those lanes. Avoid the ones where cars simply zoom past as locals have the "Hi-Pass device"/ETC (Electronic Toll Collection) unit installed and hence, need no do manual collection and payment. Yes, in case you are wondering the ETC unit works very much like Singapore's Cashcard system with ERP (Electronic Road Pricing) gantries.
3. Payment of ticket: Again, head to the lanes where there are staff on-hand to manually collect payment. Avoid automated ones as, again, they only serve drivers with the ETC unit. I can't remember the exact amount we paid, but it isn't expensive. Probably 1000-2000KRW. No worries, the staff have cash on their hands for change.
4. IF in an event that you passed through automated device during the Collection of ticket (Yep, that was what happened to us on our return trip), the machine will still let you pass as they do not have the automatic blocking/barrier, but you will meet certain difficulties when it comes to the Payment of ticket at the next gantry. Do not fret, simply tell the staff that you came from Naejangsan and he/she will understand. If you are afraid your pronunciation may fail you, present the entrance ticket for Naejangsan and I'm sure by now, they should be able to get it.
Okay, so let's get right to the beautiful scenery at Naejangsan!
If you follow my IG, this picture would have been familiar ;)
Yes, we waited for no cars to get this picture in the middle of the road. Several other folks saw us doing it and decided to give it a go as well hahahaa... What kind of practice have we imparted to Koreans?! :O
Isn't it gorgeous?! :OOO This was by far, the best sight at Naejangsan!
Scenic photo spot No.2
Darren says I took a lot of photos of trees. But how can I not?! It is not often that you see such sights in Singapore or anywhere else, for that matter right!
Temple with colourful lanterns and loud music. Think there was some kind of celebration ongoing.
Artsy photo with my boots.
Boots died at the end of the trip :( Yes I only brought one footwear and so I wore my Nike sliders all the way back to Seoul. >.< Luckily, it was night time and no one really noticed hahaha.. (I hope)
FOOD WE ATE:
1. Korean Restaurant - Korean pancake (Haemul Pajeon) and Meat
Honestly, I have no idea what this meat (pork) dish is called but the lady boss recommended it to us when we arrived at the restaurant (located along the stretch of restaurants at the foot of the mountain and we just randomly picked one because we were damn hungry by the end of our hike and it was about 4pm Korean time) She probably assumed we are from China because when she recommended the dish to us, she said "Chinese dish GOOD!". We were too hungry to correct her that we are not from China and do not necessarily appreciate Chinese dishes (I find Chinese dishes in general, to be sometimes too overly on the extreme side e.g. too oily/salty/spicy personally) and also, we are too tired to be adventurous and carefully choose what we wanted, so we simply just said Okay. Together with other side dishes and the Korean pancake, the meat dish (enough for 3 people I feel) was served and we ate everything up.
After which, we headed back to our parked car and returned the car back to the car rental service. Lotte Car Rental at Jeonju is thankfully, just a 10-minutes walk to the Express Bus terminal. (Either Google Maps or simply ask the staff for directions) We walked to the bus terminal and purchased bus tickets back to Seoul.
Buses back to Seoul leave regularly at an interval of 10 minutes so need not worry about not being able to get tickets on-time! Bus is more expensive than train tickets but definitely more comfortable! (A 4-hour bus ride with one 20-minute break at a rest stop in between where you can go to the toilet and/or get some food) For the price, you get an assigned wide, comfy seat to yourself and there's a television screen in front of you which you can tune in to watch with your own earphones. A bottle of water and some biscuits are handed out as well.
Getting here:
As mentioned, getting to Naejangsan is not easy. Driving is the best route to get here from Jeonju (1-hour car ride).
Opening hours:
From sunrise to sunset, all year around.
Advice:
Leave early from Jeonju to get to Naejangsan! Start early! By the time we parked our car (yes, be prepared to pay parking fees as well), we only started hiking at about 11am and ended at around 4pm.
Entrance fees: 3000 KRW per adult
There are plenty of hiking routes which you can take. See suggestions from their official tourist site here. Nope, we didnt follow the designated routes. We simply wanted to see the Autumn scenery, so we went to the tourist centre there and asked where are the specific places to go. They presented us with a map and we just followed the crowd/map.
Wear good hiking shoes/sport shoes to prevent unfortunate incidents like me! I only brought along my boots which aren't exactly the most comfortable pair of footwear and ended up damaging them. :( Bought a new pair (okay, 2 pairs actually) so das okay eheh :D
Bring snacks to munch on in the midst of your hike.
Transportation Advice:
Book KORAIL train tickets from Seoul (Yongsan) to Jeonju in advance. Need not book return ticket from Jeonju to Seoul in advance as there are bus routes which you can take that leaves Jeonju frequently.
For Car Rental service, remember to ask the staff to help you with the navigation destinations prior to departure. Present passport and international driver's license upon registration. SGD $100/day and you can select where you would like to drop off your car.
Prepare to pay road tolls along the way. (My description/experience of it is above. Scroll up if you haven't read it yet)
[Summary of transporation routes to take between Seoul and Jeonju]
Bus ride: 4 hours; 18 700 KRW per adult
Train ride: 3.5 hours; 17 600 KRW per adult (Mugunghwa Non-Express assigned seating)
1.5 hours; 34 400 KRW per adult (KTX Express Economy class assigned seating)
*pricing of all tickets are one-way*
Hope all these information will help you if you are intending to get to Jeonju and Naejangsan! Both places are entirely worth to visit if you would like to get out of Seoul for a bit! Next up will be my blogpost in Seoul! Click link below:
Travel Diary to South Korea - Food and Places (Part II Seoul)
If you would like, you can also view:
Tresses Hair Review on JUNO Hair Salon 2016 at Myeong Dong, Seoul
Travel Diary to South Korea - Food and Places (Part II Seoul)
If you would like, you can also view:
Tresses Hair Review on JUNO Hair Salon 2016 at Myeong Dong, Seoul
If you find this post useful, feel free to leave a comment below or even make an enquiry about anything you are unsure about! I will try my best to help (though accuracy may not be entirely 100% hahah) (:
xx
Loves,
Nices
No comments:
Post a Comment