Return To The Land of Kimchi

Part 4: Last Day :(

Day 4 (22.5.2012) (The Plan)

COEX Mall – Aquarium

Lunch and last minute shopping myeongdong

Depart from ICN - LCCT @ 12.20pm

today is our last day and we still have time to do some sightseeing as our flight is at midnite. the original plan was to go to COEX to check out the aquarium...however, as we have not visited any of the palaces, we decided to go to Chandeokgung this morning. we got up a bit early this morning.. had heavy breakfast and took the cab to the palace. we clearly told the taxi driver to take us to Chandeok palace but he dropped us off at the Changgyeong Palace instead and insist that we get off the taxi there. well, not in the mood to argue, we just go with the flow. upon enquiry at the ticket counter, the chandeok palace is accesible from one of the gates in the Changgyeong Palace. we entered the palace to see a few school kids on a field trip. it was not crowded at all, almost deserted. we thought to ourselves that this must be our lucky day as most of tourist attractions in seoul are always crowded. we quickly found out that the castle ground is not a suitable place to use the stroller as the surface was uneven as it was made of blocks of huge stones... as the weather was hot that day, i just sat under the shades with Q while waiting for the Captain exploring the palace. im not too excited as ive been to Gyeongbok Palace before and i do think they looked quite similar.

Changgyeong Palace - we had the place almost to ourselves

Hot and sunny day.. with clear blue skies

after quite a while, we proceeded to the gate to enter Chandeok Palace. to our suprise, the place was packed!! we were wondering why there was practically nobody at Changgyeong palace while this one is quite the opposite, and our question is still left unanswered. we omit the secret garden tour as it was really hot that day and we were quite turned off by the crowd. again i sat under the shades with Q while the captain explored the castle and took pictures. i discovered later that the Q to buy tickets at the Chandeok Palace entrance was very long! i began to wonder perhaps this is why the taxi driver ahjussi insisted that we go the Changgyeong Palace instead.

the Chandeok Palace on the other hand, was crowded

after the palace visit, we went to Insadong to buy some souviniers. from what ive read, insadong is within walking distance from Chandeok Palace.. so we walked there... turned out that it was not quite close after all.. it took us 20-30 mins walk frm the palace to the place. we wouldve took the taxi had we known this. luckily Q slept the whole time and we get to put her in the stroller this time. bought quite a number of stuffs from insadong, i prefer to shop here than other places. there are a lot of choices and variety of souviniers sold here. as we were quite tired from the walk from the palace before, and also famished, we did not check out the Samziegiel building - which i later regret. i did check out the restaurant - chilgabsan which was recommended on budgettraveltokorea but decided not to eat there cos i the captain is not the adventorous eater kinda person. so we went to itaewon instead.

the walk to insadong

the walk to insadong

insadong

insadong - the only place that was not crowded!

this time we ate at Murree Restaurant.. i had an array of Korean food while the captain sticked to the safe Nasi Bryani. huh..~ i knew it.. the owner was quite puzzled i ordered so many kinds of food when only the 2 of us are eating. i dont care, i just wanted to try everything as today is our last day and i had not yet had the opportunity to try any local food. i ordered kimchi stew, bulgogi and pajeon + banchans + rice. we had to wait quite a while for our food as it was all prepared from scratch i think as we can hear the owner cooking up a storm in the kitchen before we were served more than half an hour later.. it was ok cos it was worth the wait. the captain digged the bulgogi as i fell in love with the kimchi stew.. yum! indeed it was too much for us and at last the pajaeon had to be packed to go.

delish!!

yummy banchan

my fav!!

and so the days original plan was again scrapped... went back to our room to get some rest. q went to sleep and again, we took turn to do some last minute shopping. i bought nothing except for just 1 black tshirt from uniqlo which i wore during i flight home later that nite. after shopping and packing, q was still sleeping and we drag that we had to wake her up as we knw that this means disaster. we were careful enuff to wake her up and not spoil her mood. we all had dinner in the room and at 8 pm we checked out of the hotel and proceed to the airport. journey to the airport was uneventful, but we get to see the banpo bridge water fountain and were quite excited. reached the airport 45 mins later and after checking in our stuffs we found out that all the shops were closed. sigh. checked into immigration and found out that some duty free shops are still opened. yeay! i managed to buy a perfume and stock up on my skincare.

the airport was deserted..

the airport was deserted..

the flight was on time and air asia graciously gave the Hot Seat to us without our consent. given a choice i would not want to change seats as Hot Seats, while having much more room for your legs, the arm rest is not flexible which makes the seat space much more restricted. the flexibility of the arm rest is quite important for me as im travelling with a kiddo who's still breastfeeding. they were also gracious enuff to provide a bassinet for us, but Q is a lanky kid and she's really requires a lot of space when she sleeps. the result was = total disaster. she managed to sleep for the first 2 hrs as she was really tired. but after that all hell broke lose. i had to hold her most of the time while pacing to and fro in the airplane or otherwise shell throw a fit. it was the most gruelling 4 hours of my life! i was really tired and sleepy but had to hold her thru most of the flight journey. lessons learnt, no more night flight next time for us! no wonder we did not see anybody else with a toddler in the flight.

siapa di dalam??

reached LCCT earlier than planned, thank god! had bfast at The Coffee Bean as its the only place thats not crowded and the food really sucked. i think they used bad eggs as it tasted like ****! i was groggy and tired and all i need was too get some sleep and was too tired to argue and complaint. i left my food untouched which costs us RM 60++ in total and asked the captain to quickly hail a cab. reached home at 7.30am and off we doze until noon.....ZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZZZZZZZZZ.......

p/s: i think that almost all the restaurants in LCCT (tried and tested) sucked bigtime in terms of food and service. i think that they have to seriously look into this matter to maintain our country's image. eventhough the outlets are wellknown big food chains, they have to carefully employ their staffs to ensure the quality of the food and service is preserved. doesnt mean that being in a low cost airport you can skimp on the quality!