Seoul, good for the soul :)

August 2014:

After Tibet, we were in need of a relaxing holiday, and Seoul fit the bill perfectly.  We arrived into Seoul on a particularly interesting weekend... 

Friday was a national holiday in Seoul.  The Pope was in town.  Parliament was voting on stricter laws for the ferries (remember when the ferry full of school children sank?  So very sad).

As a result, the police were out in full force.  Everywhere you turned, another group of about 25 police officers were clumped together, quietly surveying the area, but prepared to leap into action at any given moment.  It was truly a bizarre scene.  We now understand why South Korea is highly regarded in their riot control skills.

 When trying to get back to our hotel after the first day, this is what we ran into on our street...crazy!  There was a protest regarding the ferry incident that veered off of its designated course...

Anyways, back to beautiful Seoul.  We decided to spend our first afternoon wandering around the city.  We happened across the changing of the guard, Korean style, at Gyeongbokgung Palace, looked on as the city prepared for the Pope in Gyeongbokgung Square, and scoped out the Korean BBQ scene.

This little girl was the CUTEST...she was practicing her English by asking me a few questions...when she was done, she literally jumped up and down for 2 minutes with the biggest smile on her face, so proud of herself :)

Fried chicken!!

What I remember most from this first day though is a certain dish that was served to us while enjoying a couple of Seoul’s finest, Cass draft.  Instead of serving the normal dish of nuts with your beer, this place thought outside the box.  We weren’t sure what it was, but what we did know is that it looked disgusting, and smelled like urine.  Once we couldn’t take it anymore, we called the waiter over to remove it…Grant then proceeded to ask what it was, and the response was priceless:  “uhhh, I can’t remember the English word for it, but it’s the stage before the butterfly”.  Yea, no thanks!

We strapped on our trainers Saturday morning, and made our way to Bukhansan National Park to enjoy what we thought would be a relaxing hike.  We should have known we were in way too deep once we realized we were the only people not in proper hiking gear from head to toe.  We marched forward though, and started our ascent to the top of Baekundae Peak.  This was the toughest hike we’ve experienced together to date.  We've been known to pack a few celebratory beverages in our packs to enjoy at the peak tops, but with this hike, we were so worried about the descent (due to the difficulty of the ascent!), that we didn't even touch them.  Instead, a sweet little Korean grandmother took pity on us (I guess we looked as exhausted as we felt!), and gave us her cucumber to snack on.  No joke.  Bless her heart, we certainly needed some non-alcoholic fuel for the trip down!  Let's just say, I could barely move for the next three days.  We did of course enjoy a celebratory drink once we were down at the bottom though...success :)

  

My face says it all...and yes, that's a cable you had to hold onto for dear life, or risk sliding down the sheer, slippery rock at the top!  So yes, my whole body was sore, including my arms!

That evening, we pushed through the exhaustion, and attended a South Korean baseball game in Gangnam.  Best decision ever.  There was constant cheering, dancing, singing and of course, waving of the blow-up bats .  And, best of all, game day hot dogs!  These fans were incredible...there was seriously never a dull moment - enjoy the video below #DoosanBears

Before waving goodbye to Seoul, we explored the Bukchon Hanok Village, home to hundreds of traditional houses...