While we were eating our evening meal, the ‘ring’ app notified us that someone was at our door
In our excitement we answered it and told the postman to put the package in the blue bin
Giddy with excitement that it had worked over the 5000 or so miles we were then brought down to earth by a message from Eloise asking what the point of her having the app was if we were going to answer it
Sorry Eloise - won’t happen again - I almost promise .... :-)
So, to today
We both slept fitfully getting used to this whole 8 hour difference malarkey so decided to breakfast in the hotel restaurant on the 27th floor
The views were amazing and the buffet choices were extensive although all of the options did have an Asian twist to them
The price wasn’t cheap but I had no fear - we Gullis’ know how to get their money’s worth from a buffet - they’ll rue the day they crossed us
Whilst eating we looked at where the National Museum of Korea was, and it was a 1hr 38 minute walk, if you didn’t get lost, in 33 degree heat
Hmm - that seemed less than appealing so after breakfast we went to the tourist information place just round the corner and asked about the subway
We gleaned all the information we could about how to buy travel cards and where to go and off we trot
He vending machine was a bit temperamental but we managed it at last and found that the Seoul subway is laid out the same as the London one, with coloured and numbered lines and the bonus was that it was hardly being used and was FULLY AIR CONDITIONED
The station was right outside the museum and the double bonus was that there were no queues and free to go in
Once in we often wondered if it had been closed while we were in it as there were so few other people
My review of it was that for me, it was a little pottery heavy, but I did find quite a few statues that took my eye
And this one reminded me of me, the morning after I’ve had a few drinks
I’ve taken many more pics but I won’t swamp this with them apart from this one, to show the scale of the building it took us over 2 hours to get round
.... and this one as I decided to give a lecture on the relative merits of capitalism v communism
We then took the subway and was even more adventurous to change our plans and go back to Myeongdong ( the shopping bit)
We needed a spot of lunch and so, for Kieren of course, we completed our fast food set for the holiday
We then went to the LOTTE city department store to see if they had Disney stuff but alas they didn’t - it’s like the Seoul equivalent of Harrods
Hattie then bought some BTS stuff and we explored a bit
Turns out exploring can be quite exhausting so we stopped in a bar for a couple of beers before heading on back to the hotel
On the way back we stumbled across a shoe store that sold BTS shoes - Harriet visibly shuddered with excitement but decided to keep her money in her pocket, for the time being
We were almost on the news so decided to record it as a “one that got away” picture
Back at the hotel we agreed to meet up at 7:30 for dinner and our rest was rudely interrupted by us all getting an emergency message on our phones explaining the dangerously highly temperatures expected tomorrow and that if possible you should not go/stay outdoors
It’s our tour of Seoul tomorrow - gulp
For the evening we decided to go back to where we went last night although through a slightly beer infused haze - we weren’t quite sure how to get there....
We did find what we were looking for eventually:
Of course we went there - why wouldn’t we? We did have a few dodgy moments when they asked for ID for Kieren and Hattie, who didn’t have any, but eventually they let us stay as long as they didn’t have any of the cool, delicious pitcher of beer we had ordered
Hahahaha as if....
We have struggled already to find Kieren appropriate food but tried him with an “assortment” of fries and fried chicken (a dish every Korean restaurant seems to promote)
He performed admirably and ate the lot
My final note on the day, is how warm, friendly and helpful everyone has been
From the woman selling us hats, the guy helping us get off the subway at the right station (not required but lovely) to the guy that chatted to Hattie in the BTS shop who said how great her Korean was - they have been a delight
They also are the most law abiding people on the planet as they REFUSE to cross the road unless the green man is lit - look at this road - it’s 12 feet across and when there were NO cars in sight, still no one moved
...and the point is that being law abiding is catching - because we stopped trying to “beat the system” too - what sheep we are :-)
Ah well - I finished the night with some blueberry soju - that should do the trick ...
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