Jungbu Market was our closest option, so we wandered through a vast array of food stalls selling everything from squid, seaweed, chilis, nuts, kimchi and prepared meals. We noticed that there was quite a reserved demeanour about all of folks working this market. Not so many of the smiling faces we had gotten used to in Korea. Still quite a nice comparison to the other markets we had visited before and definitely a good way to get the appetite going.
As seen in one of our last posts, Koreans seem to share the same love of good ole Dunkies as this Boston lady. We debated and decided against stopping at one in Busan as we had already sampled Starbucks in Japan. It did not feel like it was quite the right time to be selling our palettes to the American chain brand coffee beast again in such a short time. Now though, DD's was sounding pretty good and really, isn't it all truly about the research our experience would provide comparing a "local" favorite on the other side of the world?
Entering the Dunkin Donuts there was much more of a bakery atmosphere than any Dunkie's state side. Many more pasteries and with a staff dressed in some pretty snazzy attire. We ordered two bagel sandwiches and two iced coffees, which was a fairly difficult task and our receipt had alot more than four items on it which was pretty alarming as was the price compared to the afordability of Korean cuisine so far. We ended up with one bagel sandwich and a bagel with cream cheese... Overall, based on how difficult the ordering process was, it was a pretty successful return to us in the long run. Three out of four ain't bad. We shared and decided that Korea definitely has a leg up in the care that the preparation had and the real plates it was served on wasn't bad either.
After satisfying that basic need for sustinence and looking over the guide book, we headed to the largest Catholic church in Seoul, a cathedral to be exact and then on to have a look around the river area. We took a seat along with a fair number of Seoul dwellers under one of the bridges where folks seem to take advantage of the shade to escape the afternoon sun for awhile. There we steps to sit on by the river and a walkway along both sides with some greenery which seems like it would make for a nice place to jog or stroll. After our little break it was on to more walking and a stop in one of the historic parks of Seoul. We then headed over to one of Seoul's famous buildings, an impressive set of towers.
From there it was down another lovely avenue as we made our way to Namsan Mountain, the home of the North Seoul Tower, argueably Seoul's most famous landmark.
There are a couple differnet ways to reach the tower, either by cable car or climbing up one of Korea's impecible walking paths. Knowing we were going to be hitting one of the featured restaurants in the tower, walking seemed like a sensible choice. After climbing what seemed like an endless amount of steps and passing by an actual running track that circumnavigates the mountain - rubberized and low impact to boot, we reached the top. We bought tickets for dinner at "Hancook", a Korean buffet restaurant which also got us an entry to the observatory deck. The elevator ride up was a bit disappointing as it was sold as the "fastest elevator in the world" where you could "see the particles around N Seoul Tower fly by". This made it sound like quite an exciting ride, but it ultimately it was a totally closed elevator, with no view out to the "particles" whizzing by and just a cheesy video playing from a monitor in the ceiling. Oh well, it went up and down so as far as elevators go, it did its job.
Once at the top we found a good spot for getting in the sunset and learned just how massive Seoul really is. We knew it was a rival to NYC in size, but the view from the top truly captures just how vast this city actually is and just how neatly it is tucked in around Korea's mountains and waterways. The haze over the city, which is fairly constant due to both self-made pollution and the toxic red haze from China's plants and mines along the border make the view a bit murky, but breathtaking nonetheless. We watched the sun go down, strolled around the top and then headed to dinner.
"Hancook" has definitely gone down as one of our favorite foodie adventures so far in Korea. You are each able to choose a meat dish that will be prepared while you go up for your first picking at the buffet. Mushroom salad, tofu cakes, noodle dishes, cuttlefish salad, prawns, stir-fried pork, muscles, local fruit and much more where available for your dining pleasure. We sampled quite a few, sharing bits and pieces and sampled a bit more as our steamed ribs, ox tail and bulgogi came out piping hot. We finished it all up with some Korea desert treats that were as delightful to look at as to eat.
We finished the evening back at the observatory, not just to catch the night view, but also to pass the time waiting for the massive line for the ONE elevator down to disperse.
The lights of the city were spectacular and as closing time drew near we headed out for our walk down Namsan Mountain back to the streets of Seoul.
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