Strawberry Fields Forever

It's been a year since we booked our round-trip tickets to South Korea and the day to go has finally arrived!

We arrived at the Incheon International Airport at around 8PM.  It was a very nice airport, and like the Kuala Lumpur Internation Airport (KLIA), the arrivals / departure area is separated from the immigrations.  We had to board a train to get to the immigrations and luggage claim area.  After going through the usual immigrations process (which is hassle free, the officers barely talked to us and did NOT make us feel criminals like what I always witness HERE in PHL), we called the Incheon guesthouse and asked to be picked up.  The driver arrived in about 5 minutes and in another 5 minutes we were already in the guesthouse, checking in.  The driver turned out to be also the owner of the guesthouse and he was nice enough to offer his suggestions on where we could eat during our first night in Korea.

After putting our things away, we went down and started looking for a restaurant where we could have dinner.  We ended up eating at a Korean restaurant at the building's ground floor, and though the food was delicious, this was one of our more expensive meals during our stay, at 10,000KWN each.  After dinner, we went around the area to look for a convenience store to buy water, then went home to sleep.  It was an uneventful first night.

Day 2 greeted us with warm sunshine the following day.  But though the sun was shining, the weather was a VERY pleasant surprise: it was cold enough for us to be able to wear our coats!

Anyway, after having breakfast at one of the restaurants within the guesthouse's vicinity, we started off for Seoul at around 10AM.  We went back to the airport using one of the free airport shuttle buses and from the airport, we rode LimousineBus 6011 (the terminal is located at the ground floor) bound for Seoul.  The bus routes and schedule can be found here.

The ride to Seoul took around 45 minutes and based on our apartment's location, we were supposed to get off at the Gyeongbokgung station.  Unfortunately, we completely missed our stop because when the driver announced the station, it didn't sound like how we were expecting it to sound, so we ended up going down at the Anguk station and taking the train back to our original stop.

We got a little lost while looking for our apartment but after finally finding it, we were lucky that the landlord was already there and the guests who were checking out were also Filipino.  After leaving our things, we went around the neighborhood for a bit, then went grocery shopping at Sky Garden, then we had lunch at Momotaro, a Japanese restaurant within the condo building.  We went up to the apartment after lunch, and after some house rules discussion with Steve the landlord, we were off to our first sightseeing tour.  I think it was around 4PM by then.

First stop was sightseeing at Gyeonbokgung Palace, which was walking distance from our apartment.   It was magnificent!  For an entrance fee of 3,000KWN, one will be able to see and experience the main and largest palace of the Five Grand Palaces built by the Joseon Dynasty (info from Wikipedia).  It was a grand experience and one travelling tip that I have to give out is that one should wear REALLY comfortable shoes.  The place was HUGE and it was a bit tiring to go all over the place... but still worth it.

After the tiring walk around the palace, we rested for a bit at a Starbucks at Anguk then walked over to Insadong.  Insadong is a popular tourist attraction around the Jongno-gu area.  It has traditional as well as modern Korean shops, a lot of art galleries, teahouses, restaurants, and A LOT of souvenir shops.  This place has that distinct Korean feel which makes it popular among tourists.  And an added bonus for us was the STREET FOOD!  We had street food for dinner: Chicken barbecue and traditional Korean pancakes.  After dinner, we were too tired to do anything more so we took a cab home and rested.  I think we ended the day at around 10PM.

Now here are the pics:

Overall, this was a tiring but really worth it day.  It's official, I fell in love with Korea on this day.  

KL's LCCT Airport surprised me.  For a budget terminal, I was expecting something like NAIA Terminal 4, but I was pleasantly surprised.  

The airport was BIG and can actually compete with the regular airports in Manila.  In fact, it looks even  better than NAIA Terminal 1.  Alighting from the plane, you have to go through a covered walkway to the Arrivals Area.  The arrivals area is ok, although two complaints that I have would be the gloomy lighting and the women's lavatory... it STINKS!  It smells as if 1 ton of danggit was stored inside.  I'm not sure if it's just bad timing but I really hope the maintenance folks would do something about the smell.

Immigration process was a breeze in Malaysia.  The immigration folks are nice and do not ask questions.  They do not power trip nor do they make you feel like a criminal.  They just get your passport, scan it, then ask you to place your fingertips on this censor, and you're done!

Anyway, one thing about the airport that I liked was that there were a lot of telecoms carrier offering free local simcards. provided that you buy some of their prepaid plans.  My friend Angel got one of the sim cards and bought the 3 days unlimited data plan for around 40MYR... not bad, considering that the data speed was good.  Also, there were a lot of shops and restaurants inside the airport, so there are a lot of things to keep you busy while waiting for your flight.

The airport is FAR from the city and I am thankful that there are a lot of transportation options available  in the airport.  There are shuttle services, taxis, buses, trains, private cars, etc.  My friends and I opted for the Fast train, which was cheap, convenient, and fast.  For 22MYR, you get a round trip ticket for the shuttle bus that will take you to the Salak Tinggi Train Station and for the train ride that will take you to the KL Sentral Station.

Now, on with the pics!

Overall, the experience at KL's LCCT was good. The airport was convenient, comfy and nice so I would have to commend the Malaysia government for giving this budget airport a not-so-budget feel.