Finally back home. South Korea was a blast, highly recommend it to anyone.
Seoul was a blast, could have easily spent a month, if not more just exploring the city and trying out all the food. The palaces and shrines were cool as heck - right in the middle of the city too, cheonggyecheon stream was a ridiculously cool walk, even in the winter. Dongdaemun night markets are sheer insanity. The Namsan hanok village was cool - Bukchon was way too crowded with schoolgirls(?) dressing up in hanbok and all the random photoshoots with what I assume to be celebs. Had a real Venice moment there.
A DMZ trip is definitely something everything should experience once, though the infiltration tunnels should only be tried once. We were super lucky in a way, both sides were super tense and there were quite a few hold ups while we were in the JSA/MDL. Dudes running all over the place at points.
Busan is also crazy, I could live off the seafood there. Haeundae beach really reminded me of the GC, except people actually feed the seagulls. Gamcheon cultural village is definitely a site to see and Beomeosa Temple is stunning - such a change of pace from the inner city.
Jeju island is just breathtaking, just the climb up of Seongsan Ilchulbong makes it easy to see why it's world heritage spot. The view from the peak and the walk down even more so. The walk through the lava tubes is also another really cool walk. Too bad we didn't really plan ahead here, we should have hired a car but none of us had international drivers permits. Google maps is messed up in Korea and the busses come every hour or so, we ended up waiting around a fair bit unnecessarily. Still, amazing place. The black pork is probably the best pork I've had too.
Very easy to get by with no knowledge in the language either. The most trouble we had was when we wondered into restaurants where the menu's didn't have pictures, the rest of the time we were all good. I had more trouble with people mistaking me for Korean (asian but I don't particularly look like I'm from any one country), quite a few older people asking me for directions on the subway and even younger people in restaurants giving me a big spiel about their favourite foods there.
Definitely heading back at some point in the future - probably when it's not so cold. I've got a soft spot for all the angry ajumma's and I love makgeolli now. Already eyeing up a japan trip at the end of the year though.
