Spring At Korea

The last time I visited Korea when it was spring, slightly changed the season back to summer. Not too hot but dry, where I perpetually found the flowers and leaves blossoming everywhere. The autumn forced the leaves to be colorful, but spring forced them to be greenish as well. That should be the right time for us to go to flower parks, but another notion eventually came up against the fact that we must go to the parks with much of plants and flowers everywhere. We didn't know why, we just wanted to wander through any new places. And we have the urge to drift over the river, Han River (Hangang).

It's been many times for us to across Han river when we took subway train from Suwon to Seoul, and conversely. But beneath of it, we realized that some day we must go utterly down to the border of the river, enjoying the air while sniffing the fresh vague odor vapored from the river (don't compare it with Ciliwung :D) The Han River is a major river in South Korea and the fourth longest river on the Korean peninsula, flows through Seoul and ended to the Yellow Sea.

To get there, we used subway metro train. As a matter of fact, we were headed to Namdaemun first to go shopping (Suwon - Geumjeong - Seoul Station), and from Seoul Station we were headed to Han River (Seoul Station - Yongsan). Actually from Yongsan station, it took much time to approach Han River, but it's OK. We were stopped by there to wander around the department store which mostly sell the electronic apparatus. As we were contented enough, we continued the journey walking to Han River, which was gleaming under the shining sun.


The night is the night we spent, by roaming around hotel neighborhood, to the city park, promenade, scanned over the restaurants, gazed people in deep conversation, even if they just talked about tedious stuff.


Next weekend, not much we did, again we just trotted up to the nearest park from the hotel called Hyoseong, then we entered the Wolhwawon Palace, in the back of Gyeonggi Art Center. Wolhwawon is the Chinese traditional garden which is not huge, but offers exotic moods and evergreen trees, with a glimpse of something unique to the garden. Also, the various colors of the trees make visitors feel more comfortable and secure. The spot I liked was a quite large pond in the back of the building. There were goldfishes swimming over and sometimes followed us as if they wanted to chase us for food. Honestly, I enjoyed the Chinese model garden better than the Korean ones.


On the next weekend, we tried to pull up the energy, yeah ... it's time to go on the journey to the farthest destination we had that day, Full House vacation. Do you guys recognize Full House? I'm quite sure all of you just think it is like a card game, but surely it's not. Maybe there are some of you realizing that Full House is a Korean serial drama performed by Song Hye Kyo and Rain? Yeah, that's what I'm talking about :D That day, we were headed to Full House location where the movie took place.

Full House is located in Sido Island, the tiny island closed to Incheon Airport. To get there, first we must go by subway train from Suwon (our residence) to Guro, then from here we must transit to another train headed to Incheon. There was a city tour bus which took us to get arround the Incheon district. But before we wandered around by bus, we visit China town near the Incheon station :D


After getting pulses of joy warmed up, we were ready to go. The city tour bus swept over the road until we reached the harbor. We got on the ferry to accross the sea strait. While onto the ferry, we enjoyed the spring breeze and fed some seagulls flying around us to get sympathetic look which made us threw any food or snack we had to them. When we arrived Yongyudo Island, we continued the tour. An old guy gave a bunch of information to the passengers about Yongyudo in Korean (I just heard the mumbling voice since I don't know Korean at all :D) We got past Incheon airport and the beach called Eurwangni beach, and then we got off in the way of road. At the first, we were confused how to find the next harbor, but we try to use our instinct, so we just walked casually toward the harbor. Fortunately, this is the harbor that we're looking for, Sammok harbor.

From Sammok, we accrosed the sea strait towards Sindo Island. From Sindo we must continued the journey to Sido Island by bus. To get Sido from Sindo, we didn't have to get ferry or canoe, because there's a not-too-long-bridge between them. I wonder why two islands is separated by a sea which resembles a river between them. Yeah, we were fantasized and wondered till we didn't realize that the bus drove us off to Modo Island. We get looooooooossssssttttttttt !!!!!!!!!

"Be calm, lads! We are not that lost!" I think.
Eventhough we have passed different island, but the driver told us to stay in the bus, because the bus would be driven back to Sindo - the departure site, and bus would surely pass the same road as before. Thanks God, eventually we got off from bus in the On Set Full House, Sido Island. But stony face made us stand still a while. Is it true that we were already there? Or is it just hoax? So where's the beach?

Gosh, the Full House was still far far away from where the bus put us off. We decided to walk through the pathway. An old guy offered us a bicycle for rent towards Full House, he said that it is still far from there. But we sturdily believe that it's not that far although some of us want to rent bicycles just to have fun with them. Ignoring and believing, until a black car pulled over to hover us, the driver offered us the car and negotiate about the price. That time, all we do was not ignoring, we were just believing :D So we took a car to get Full House in hand.

Winter At Korea

Not much we did in the winter, because we spent most of the times inside the hotel, getting warm under our blanket, hibernated like a polar bear :D Yet, we're not merely sleeping and shuffling around the room lazily, so we decided to go against the cold wind. We were often stumbled or lapsed upon the melting ice when swinging through the pavement. the first destination must be to the same place again, Hwaseong (again? yeah, it was my third visit)


The second weekend, we went to Indonesian Embassy to celebrate Idul Adha. The embassy is located in Yeouido-dong. Quite far walking from the subway station. We did praying, listening to sermons, and finally got a supper. Unfortunately we didn't make bull/cow/goat sacrifice there. We didn't know why. After that, we were headed to Itaewon, the most exotic place in Seoul representing fusion culture with a distinctive atmosphere. There were mostly several immigrants from other part of Asia, Africa, and Europe, as if I was standing on everywhere else except Korea. We did praying in Seoul Central Mesjid and then dashed over the promenade between shopping center.


And for the next, some of us had an enjoying freezing time to go watching soccer game in Suwon Worldcup Stadium.


Before going home early, we decided to have a dinner in restaurant, near Suwon Station. The main menu it offered was roasted spicy chicken. It was so delicious. You must try it if you go to Suwon. I forgot the name of the restaurant but the location is reachable, across Suwon Station and the restaurant stood up in the border of the road, so it's easy to find.

Autumn At Korea

Here the time. The second time visiting Korea, at the top of fall season. Damn, the weather is so cold, like living in a mountain tip (before I hadn't realized that winter air would be my nightmare). In the entirely month, not much we did except shopping and hanging out in the same place like before. The default place to go was market, it could be Namdaemun or Insadong. But for this chance, we did some different trips. They are Korean Folk Village and Hwaseong Fortress. Before, I have ever visited to Hwaseong but I found some different ambiences for this opportunity. At the first time, it's like I visited Haenggung (The palace) near Hwaseong, but in this second time, I did march with my friends, tracking around the fortress, from the entrance gate and then walked around like tracking on Great Wall China, ended up in the entrance gate. So it made us tired but enjoy time.

The weather was quite cool, but still not cold yet. The leaves of the trees changed their color turned into yellow and red, so beautiful. Most of all haven't fallen to the ground, but a few have. To get there, we could catch taxi for KRW3500 from Inggye-dong (where Stay 7 hotel locates), or if any of you want to catch the bus, I think you must get the bus headed to Suwon Station (Suwon Yok) and then change the bus to Paldalmun (the fare is around KRW2500). You can get off to the Paldalmun Gate if you want to hike and track the Hwaseong fortress, but you could get off to the next bus stop after Paldalmun Gate if you want to visit Hwaseong Haenggung (Hwaseong Palace).


The second special tour is visiting to Korean Folk Village. This is the artificial village where traditional Korean people was built up in the previous time, located in Yongin, near Suwon City. Korean Folk Village is also the filming location for the famous movie Scandal as well as the TV miniseries Daejanggeum. There are numerous replicas of traditional houses of the different social classes (peasant, landowner, yangban) and the various regions. And also, we found amusement park, a river with some trees in the right and left side, it's been like I lived in real village at the pre-war ancient times.

To get there we must go to Suwon Station (Suwon Yok), the fare was KRW1000. And continue to get the shuttle bus for Korean Folk Village destination, it takes about 35 minutes but it's free. Maybe this is one of the facilities given by the tourism spots service. Don't forget to see the schedule of bus departure when you visit and go back from Korean Folk Village. For the departure from Suwon Station, it runs five time a day.(10:30a.m. 11:30a.m. 12:30p.m. 1:30p.m. 2:30p.m.), 30 minute ride. But the returning schedule it must be in the evening, as I know the last shuttle bus operated at 5:00p.m. If you missed it, I bet you had to catch the city bus to return back to the town.