Seoul - Day 2

We wanted to go to Lotte world (an amusement park) but due to our late evening/morning we didn't get up early enough to make it there. So what does a person do when you cannot think of what to do and you're a little tired. 

Off to the Spa! We hopped on the train and we were on our way with little difficulties. Side note: If you get off at the wrong stop you will have to call for assistance to get them to let you to the other side. Lesson is if you want to switch to the opposing platform it might not be possible without asking for someone to let you through. 

Dragon Hill Spa cost 11,000Won and from there you get a bracelet where you can touch to anything inside. When you finally leave you just 'check out' and they charge you for whatever you used. 

I cannot recommend this spa enough, since it is Korean style it is just such an awesome way to spend the day. 

Part 2 of this day was us trying to make it to N Seoul Tower. Now we got off at the stop we were suppose to, then I realized that you have to take a yellow bus to the tram stop...okay we don't know where it is. 

Due to the fact that we can see the tower we just started walking up the hill. After a very long steep walk we finally made it to the top I think it took us over an hour from the train station. At least we didn't have to pay for bus or tram up. In the end we missed our chance to eat dinner at the top since everything closed at 10pm even though the signs all say 11pm. (I guess that is only for the weekend?) 

There was one last thing that I wanted to mention was the fact that at the top there are millions of locks. Where lovers (or friends) put their lock and toss away the key. Now I don't know a lot more information than that but there are a lot of them. Some are rusted quite badly so I think that they have been doing this for sometime. It is more bittersweet for me to see all these locks. 

Landing in Seoul

I arrived in Seoul and everyone was more aggressive than I was used to I couldn't figure out what the huge rush was. I guess people had places to be, onto the train, straight to immigration and off to baggage claim.

I was already quite flustered from my earlier experience with vanilla air. The check in line was super long, dashing through security and immigration. I felt like I would never make it to the gate and of course when I arrived I was told that boarding would be delayed 20 minutes.

Seoul city has buses and trains galore but it was easy enough to navigate your way out of the airport. I took the bus for 10,000W and I was bound for the Namdanam market. Tucked away in a small alley was my hostel, it had everything I needed.  Through I wouldn't have complained if there was a bit more space. That would have been ideal if I had a choice to change anything about this little hostel. Then again for 20,000W a night I couldn't really complain.

The first night was us heading out to Hongdae area to find a watering hole. The streets were scoured by street food and lots of random market nick-nacks. We went in and out a couple places where the waiters insisted that we buy some food, we weren't opposed to buying food but the problem was that it was giant portions if large greasy food and we already ate dinner.

We kept going in to little bars and clubs, with that we were able to pound back a couple of drinks. During this search for a place where we could drink all evening we walked past a club with a never ending line, I wish I knew who was headlining. In the end we settled on a place where the food was fairly cheap and heather was able to finally get her makgori.

As the evening progressed the table of Korean guys next to us became very social. They clinked their shot glasses of shoju and practiced what really broken English with the intent if hitting on my friend. Next thing I knew it was 3:30am and it was time to see if we could walk home.

The walk home wasn't so bad when we looked at the map but we weren't walking at top speed...before we knew it an hour and a half had already gone by. The streets are filled with people on the weekend even in the early morning hours you can still get tagged by a questionable person. Soon we were in a taxi on our way back to the hotel. 

Mitake Mountain, Japan

This was one of those places that I have always wanted to go to in Japan, it isn't too far away from the center of Tokyo either about an hour train ride. So finally before my good friend Cindy left japan we made it out there after weeks of pondering and procrastinating.

It was totally worth it, I packed us an obento and we started to walk to see the waterfalls. I highly recommend this place for anyone that is visiting Tokyo and want to step out of high paced city life.

Give it a go!

 Here is a short video after the downpour we got caught in, it was a beautiful day...

Kamakura's Birthday

This was Kamakura's birthday, which is a stone Buddha. I am unsure about the age but the celebrations had everyone and their dog on the beach. Seriously I have never been on a beach with so many people before.

Sorry for the incoherantness of the following videos and I also don't know why the last video has no sound. Umm... the first one is the best. Thanks Cindy for the wonderful random day!

A day on the beach with a guitar

I am bringing you a couple of the video posts that I have yet to share with people on facebook. I have been lacking on the blog post front so there will be a couple more posts like this one. I just needed to make sure that I document them before I forgot I had even taken these videos. 

This day had no rhyme or reason to it, my friend asked me what I wanted to do. I said 'let's go to the beach' we brought a guitar and got a tan. So here are the two videos that we made, I hope you enjoy them. 

It was a nice day to get out of town and learn about new music, play some old and poke at some little crabs. This was on the outskirts of Odaiba in Japan just outside of Tokyo.

Osaka- Universal Studios Japan

The picture here to the right is what I always thought of Osaka, the little brother of the rest of Japan.

He is a little more out there, a little more unique in speak and mannerisms. Visiting Osaka was something I had always wanted to do and most of all I was luckily to do it with a Japanese friend and my BFF.

So we were ready to take on Osaka without any hesitation. We took the night but in from Tokyo which took about 5 hours and we arrived at 6am. Trekked over to our cheap little hostel which I wouldn't recommend but sufficed for the time that were in Kansai since it was only $20 a night.

From there we mapped out some places that we wanted to visit and made sure we got photo opts of the things that make Osaka, well Osaka. I am going to skip those since the majority of them were shared on facebook and this post is going to be dedicated to USJ. I have never been to Universal Studios in the States so this was going to be a really interesting event.

Before I go ahead and start writing about all the things that USJ has to offer, Osaka has quite a few little sights as well that you can explore. We didn't make enough time to see everything so we made sure to hit up the Osaka Castle and the park that surrounds it.

We were able to learn quite a bit about the history and most of all I was really impressed by the usefulness of the floors that creek.As you can see the weather was fabulous while were there and the food was great as well.We made sure to make Okonomiyaki while were in Osaka!

Universal Studios cost 7000yen for a one day pass. The line ups aren't short but they move quickly. In the line ups they have TVs showing your most memorable moments with in the movies.

We were able to hit up Jurassic Park, Terminator, Back to the Future, Spiderman, a rollercoaster. There were many children rides but by the time we were done all the rides we were pretty much ready to head on out.

I know that I would love to head to the one in the California now. I am sure that the rides there would be fantastic. Sadly the Jaw's ride was closed this day, we also were a month too early for the Harry Potter exhibit. Actually, I was quite relived to find this out because I can't imagine how many people would have been there if we were there during the first month of that ride opening.

I recommend going!

A Day in Kobe

Kobe a port city with a huge European influence and a China town. I was really happy to see a China town, honestly I miss Chinese food. I love Japanese but there are days when I can really go for some Dim Sum, rice noodles, congee and some duck. I made sure to drag Karrie to a place that served Dim Sum, but it turned out to be ramen in a taishoku type of Japanese fusion with a couple pieces from the Dim Sum menu. Nothing like the authentic stuff but that is what you get when you try to get another countries food in a different country.

The last random stop after the street market, where I befriended a vendor with a guitar. A long rest in the park listening to a man practicing saxophone and walking along the pier.


On our way back to the station to head back to Osaka we passed an Owl cafe. Karrie had moral dispute about the treatment of these animals of prey. I agree that they should be able to fly free and be wild. It was still an experience for me where we paid 1000yen to spend an hour with these birds. I know there will never be a point in my life where I will ever be this close to an owl, or a hawk.

All in all a great day in Kobe.