Friday, July 27, 2018

Day 7 : Namsan & Namdaemun & Myeong-dong

That morning, we were headed to Namsan. I found the instructions from the guidebook a bit unclear, and even the directions online were hazy. And as a result, we missed the elevator - the Namsan Oreumi Elevator - which brings visitors to Namsan Cable Car Station.

As soon as we exited the subway station, we had been following the signboards, and it led us to the edge of Namsan Park. We could see the tower and it looked pretty far ... and so we stopped to ask an old ahjusshi who was manning a private parking lot. He's probably used to people asking him for directions .... so he said to us, "walk, bus or cable car" .... heh ....

At that point, we thought we'd either take the bus or walk. If we were to walk, he told us to take the flight of stairs up to the park, and from there there was a trail up to Namsan Tower. He said that the stairs was a drama filming spot and suggested we went to have a look ....

Samsooni Stairs  


The stairs where the drama "My Name is Kim Sam Soon" took place .... the kindly Ahjusshi's little kiosk is just across the road, down the stairs .... 

From here, we decided to walk up to Namsan Tower .... the road was good and I loved the lush green surroundings, the air was fresh and the weather was rather pleasant that morning .... 

We walked slowly up the slopes .... it probably took us about 20 minutes .... 

And when we finally reached there, the view was rewarding .... 

 View of Seoul from Namsan ... 

That's the tower .... N Seoul Tower

Namsan Tower featured in many Korean dramas .... like My Love from the Star and even the Legend of the Blue Sea .... 

And so we had a look around the place ... there were so many love locks!! 




We hanged out at the tower for a while .... people-watching, chit-chatting .... and then decided to head back down. We'd take the bus down. The bus is the easiest and most cost-effective way down ....

If I were go go to Namsan next time, I'd take the bus up from the nearest subway station. Read here

We got off at Namdaemun .... what a huge market and the first thing we spotted was the famous hotteok stall ..... long queue indeed!!! We joined the queue too!


Vegetable Hotteok 

So delicious! 
At first bite, it may seem to be bland .... but the more you chewed, the tastier the it became .... 

All that walking and I was still hungry ..... so we went to the food alley .... 

Banchan ... loved the seaweed salad ...

Patjuk 
Red bean porridge .... it's salty!! Heh .... back home, we normally have our red bean soup sweet but here it's a savoury dish one eat with banchan ...... 

Dolsot bibimbap .... loved the burnt rice at the bottom of the pot ... 
It was indeed a wholesome, fibrous and healthy meal with lots of vegetables ...

We browsed around Namdaemun .... I did not have anything particular to buy, but I was amazed at the costume jewellery wholesalers. There were so many of them! And the many accessories they sold just blew me away!! So many pretty trinkets and blings! 

Sitting down at 7-11 with my Binggrae coffee milk .... 

Namdaemun 

I was too full to try these dumplings ...

We walked to Myeong-dong after that. Myeong-dong was more modern and had lots of cosmetics shops. We walked past shops and there given free samples of facial masks ..... 

Myeong Dong

The sales people spoke Mandarin; normally I'd enquire in English but they'd asked you if you could speak Mandarin and inform you they could speak Mandarin better .... and were pushing for sales in every shop. There were also snacks sold on the street ..... 

ME and I did not buy any cosmetics that evening .... so we walked around, soaking in the atmosphere ... and soon we left .... 

Dinner was Korean fried chicken at BHC .... 




Well, the chicken was so crispy and had a nutty flavour to it! So good! We wouldn't get this quality back home in Malaysia .....



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