Mr. & Mrs. Vandebilt + kids

Jacob and I have now made two trips to Seoul. We went the first time on a bit of a whim when Laura was here to visit and the second time was a little more planned when Dad was here.  We had been wanting to go for a while but we had been waiting for it to warm up a little before we made the trip. It’s actually a fairly easy trip to make. There are several trains daily from Ulsan to Seoul but the one we took both times leaves 7am from Ulsan then you transfer in DongDaegu to catch the KTX. The KTX is the ‘bullet’ train in Korea, going at about 300km/h. You end up arriving in Seoul at 10:40, which is more than enough time to fit in a full day on Saturday.

Trip one was a little disorganized seeing as we only decided to go at midnight Friday. We hopped on the Seoul City Tour just outside the Seoul Station. This was probably the first indication that I was going to be disappointed by Seoul. The tour left more than a bit to be desired as it was really only a shuttle to the popular Seoul destinations. We did however get to see Gyeongbukgung (the palace) as well as Insa-Dong my favourite part of Seoul. And of course, no trip is complete without a visit to the tower.

That being said, the second trip was quite nice. We got to see a Taekwondo demonstration at one of the palaces that was quite impressive. We also went back to the palace that night to watch some play on the history of something. It was all in Korean so we didn’t really catch much of the show but it was still surprisingly entertaining. We also headed out on the DMZ tour. This was one of the activities Jacob and I had most been looking forward to. For us, the DMZ really defines Korea and Korean history. We unfortunately were only able to do half the tour and didn’t get to see Panjumeon or the JSA because it doesn’t run on Sundays.

I think the DMZ tour could have been informative and entertaining except that we had a bad tour guide with a huge language barrier. She wasn’t able to offer any additional information on any of the sites we were at and we were seriously pressed for time. We’d arrive at a location only to find out that we had to be back to the bus in 15 minutes.

I had high expectations for Seoul after our trip to Tokyo. While the rest of Korea is nothing like Tokyo I didn’t really feel they were fair comparisons. Now that we’ve been to Seoul though, I’d have to say that Tokyo wins, hands down. Tokyo was easy. Everything was in English, there were maps and directions everywhere. Seoul had more English than other areas and was a bit cleaner than what we are used to but still has a long way to go. It was worth the trip, and we had a good couple of weekends but I think I can safely say I’ve crossed Seoul off my list.

Pictures are here.