Seoul Friday night/Saturday morning Arrive Newark airport. Some guy in our group had a passport from a country that Hong Kong required a visa from to travel through which he didn't have. While the professors and he tried to figure out what to do with him, I took the rest of our group to the terminal b priority pass lounge. We arrived at around 945, and they were starting to close it down, but let us in anyways and we got a few drinks. The lounge was just alright, but that could be attributed to the fact that they were trying to close. Went through security and boarded our 1am flight to Hong Kong. We flew Cathay pacific, they served drinks and dinner about two hours in then I passed out. I woke up about 8 hours later and looked out the window and saw this. Spoiler northern lights over Russia Sunday Arrived Hong Kong and went through security. We had about an hour to kill before boarding so we went to the Plaza Premium lounge west hall. Significantly better than Newark with beer on tap, espresso machine, good food spread, and a couple food stations. Spoiler Plaza Premium west lounge Left there and boarded the flight to Seoul. Arrive Seoul and take a long ass bus ride to our hotel in Myeongdong. We explored the Myeongdong for a bit, which is a cool pseudo pedestrian area with stores and food carts everywhere. We also checked out Seoul city hall and Deoksugung. Spoiler myeongdong Seoul city hall Deoksugung Monday Got up and went to Gyeongbokgung. It was massive and we got to see the changing of the guard. We had a guided tour which was interesting at first, but an hour in we were ready to be done. Spoiler Gyeongbokgung Changing of the guard After Gyeongbokgung we went to N Seoul Tower which is definitely worth a visit. Before going I didn't realize just how sprawling Seoul is. Spoiler looking North from Seoul tower Tuesday Tuesday morning we went to Suwon to see Hwaseong fortress which was pretty cool. The fortress walls and gates still stand, but the city has grown inside of it. Following the fortress we headed to Songdo, a planned city built on 1500 acres of reclaimed land where construction was started in 2004 and finished earlier this year. The city is already covered in apartment, retail, and commercial buildings. We walked around Central Park for a bit and got lunch in downtown before heading to Samsung Biologics for a site tour of their $850m project. That night we went the Cheonggyecheon, a steam that flows through the downtown Seoul. There's a lot of bars and restaurants in the area and definitely worth checking out at night. Spoiler Hwaseong Songdo Central Park Cheonggyecheon Wednesday Drove out to Mabuk-dong to tour Hyundai Green Smart Innovation Center. Jet lag really hit me that morning and I found the whole tour incredibly boring. The building included offices and apartments and the whole thing was zero energy utilizing solar, geothermal, wind, etc. Following the Hyundai tour we went to Hanyang University for a tour and lectures about construction topics. That night I went out with another guy to Dangdaemun which was pretty sweet. We checked out the endless hallways of shops containing more hats and scarves than I've ever seen. After determining we'd seen enough hats, we stumbled off to find Gwangjang market. That place was incredible. Walking in was overwhelming; smells is never smelled before, Koreans shoulder to shoulder walking around and sitting at benches eating dumplings or soup and thoroughly enjoying soju. We explored up and down and eventually passed a fried chicken place. It was amazing and the woman covered the cup of fried chicken chunks in “chicken sauce” which was basically sweet and sour. We then moved on and found a stand with a massive pile of dumplings. We sat there for who knows how long, eating plates of dumplings and downing soju while screaming “gyeonbae” to the delight of all the Koreans around us. We somehow made our way back to the hotel. Spoiler gwangjang More Cheonggyecheon Thursday We went to Cheongdeokgung palace. It looks pretty similar to Gyeongbokgung, but smaller. It's worth a visit if you're in the area, but if you already saw the other palace I see no need to go to this one. Only difference is that there is the secret garden in the back which I'm sure is more interesting when there is greenery and not everything is still dead from winter. After Cheongbeokgung, we did a tour of Incheon Bridge. The bridge connects Incheon and Songdo spanning 13.28 miles. That night we went out to namdaemun. It was ok, we got there around 730 and it seemed like half of it was closed. We couldn't tell if it was too early or too late since it was supposed to be a night market. After that disappointing stop we went back to dongdaemun to find our favorite dumpling stand. Unfortunately, it seemed to be quieter than the night before since we had been there around dinner time and we got there Thursday night around 930-10. The ajumma running the stand immediately recognized us and was excited to see we brought more people back with us. We had more dumplings and got the soup as well. We added the green peppers, much against the advice of the ajumma. Don't do this, the soup is plenty spicy already. Spoiler Incheon bridge diorama Incheon bridge museum Namdaemun gate Dongdaemun Friday Friday we had to get up earlier for our trip to the DMZ. Unfortunately, Tillerson was visiting the the JSA, so all tours were cancelled that day, which was pretty disappointing. We got to the civilian checkpoint and a ROK soldier boarded the bus and checked everyone's passport. Security was tight, no pictures were allowed between stops. We were able to go to “the third tunnel” in the dmz, one of four tunnels the ROK has discovered the north were building as invasion passages. We couldn't bring our phones down. We had to wear hard hats and I laughed at all the scrapes on the top from people hitting their heads. Walking down what had to be the steepest ramp, we found the tunnel, which at its tallest was 6ft. Me being my cocky self and happy that being short comes in handy only a few times walked completely upright. Terrible mistake. The Koreans had built a series of three walls to block off the tunnel, but you can walk a few hundred meters down and look through a space in the first wall to see the second. In all, the closest you can get to the boarder is 170m. Going back up was a sweaty nightmare. I chuckled to myself as I saw fat people stumlbing down the ramp as I knew they'd never be able to make it back up. Next we went into the museum and watch an incredible propaganda video about the evil North Korean army reminiscent of a starship troopers recruitment video. Following the tunnel we went to an observation point where we could see North Korea and hear propaganda loudspeakers coming from both sides. Next was Dorosan Station. It was nothing special really, but they talked about how it would be a hub on the trans-Eurasian railway that might someday exist. Once we got back we went to the aforementioned secret garden in Changdeokgang palace. As said before, it was interesting, but definitely lacking since most things hadn't started growing yet. At this point jet lag was hitting me hard, so we just wandered around Insadong for a bit to get souvenirs. I was wanting to get a chopsticks set, but all the sets there were Chinese crap. We went to Lotte in myeongdong to see if they had any better options. If you want real chopsticks sets, go there. I picked up a few sets of brass chopsticks and spoons for friends and family. After getting my souvenir, we wandered around myeongdong for a bit, had some delicious stuffed crab shells, chicken skewers, glowing lightbulb drinks, and other delicious street foods. Spoiler 3rd tunnel Observation point looking west Northwest North. Note the black tower in the middle, it has a large North Korean flag on it. Dorasan Station Chandeokgung Secret Garden Myeongdong stuffed crabs Saturday I got up this morning and decided to head to the coffee shop across the street from our hotel. I got a nitro coffee and it was delicious. We then had a tour of Bukchan village. At this point we could've all given the tour ourselves of the way the hanok was constructed. The guided tour was unnecessary and the only interesting part was the Main Street where everyone takes their pictures. Next we headed to the Korean national museum. We were let loose to explore, so we decided to leave and go to the Korean memorial instead. I would definitely recommend visiting. Allow 2-3 hours, because we were there for 1.5 and only saw one floor. Next we took the subway down to Gangnam to check out Samsung D’Light where they showcase all their new technologies. It sounded cooler before we actually got there. If you're in the area, check it out, but it's not worth going out of your way. We then met up with the rest of the group to have our last dinner in Korea. Myself and the two other guys I had spent most of our free time with wandered around Gangnam drinking soju and stumbled into a pool hall. It was not what we expected. It was hazy from all the cigarettes the Koreans chain smoke and all the tables but one didn't have pockets. We were able to grab the pocketed table and played a round of cutthroat, trying to figure out what form of pool the Koreans were playing while they watched us drunkenly play the worst game of pool ever. We then headed back towards the hotel and stumbled into a BBQ place. It was delicious and we were upset that we hadn't been taken to a BBQ place all week. I would've eaten Street food and BBQ all week if I had the choice. Spoiler Bukchon Village War memorial Gangnam BBQ Sunday Woke up and took the subway to the train station. Jumped on a high speed train to the airport. We were there a few hours early so I took most of the group to the Asiana lounge. This was the nicest one we'd been in so far. Next we boarded our flight and arrived in Hong Kong. We had 20 minutes from landing to boarding for the next flight so we were hurrying through the airport. As we were waiting in the Hong Kong security line I pulled up the flight status and saw it was delayed by an hour. We got through security and went to the Plaza Premium lounge in the east hall(on the mail floor), the other two are at the other end of the terminal and require an escalator ride. The lounge was legit with hot food and beer. We got in line for boarding, but at the bottom of the jetway was another security checkpoint where they were making everyone dispose of liquids, which was quite upsetting to me because airplanes are incredibly dry. Got on the plane and it's full of a Chinese tour group who are being as loud as possible while trying to change seats. After the flight crew finally got them seated, we took off. They continued to be loud as hell and leave their lights on after they fell asleep because they're all inconsiderate pricks. Spoiler Seoul Incheon Airport Asiana Lounge All in all it was a good trip and I would recommend seoul to anyone. If anyone has any questions or I missed anything feel free to ask.
i went for a bachelor party so we mostly just acted like idiots. we worked with a cuban guy before going that was recommended to us to figure out activities. i would consider looking for a guide or agent or something because there isn't a ton of information online. our guy was just so so, imo. hotel nacional and east beach were our 2 main day activities. touring old havana and wandering through the markets and streets was also cool. ivan chef justo and vistamar were good restaurants. fabrica del arte was the spot for going out (bourdain goes in his cuba episode). you might have to pay to cut the line there. buena vista social club was pretty lame.
Kathmandu was crazy to experience, but a pretty shitty city. The stupas and nightlife are cool, but the city is so polluted. 90% of the people walk around with masks, and I was only there for 2 days and my throat got all scratchy. Kind of ruins most of it. Pokhara though...this place is incredible. 8 hour bus ride on absolutely terrible roads.
UK followed suit and sounds like Canada might implement a ban as well. Seems to be coming from actual intelligence per a BBC article I saw earlier.
Hey, could you send that out? Looking at taking a 12 day trip to Croatia in late August/ early September and this would be very helpful. TIA.
Don't really have one at this point. No plans to move over there just yet, but we'll see things always change. My best shot at a job is in London so I'll need to get over there soon before Brexit.
That's cool. What line of work are you in? I honestly think I'd love to move somewhere overseas for a couple years. My wife, not so much.
Sales at a fintech company. My ultimate goal is learn another language so then I'm not restricted to just English-speaking countries.
Hopefully that ban doesn't get extended to other countries as a long flight without any electronics would suck. Big difference between the US and UK ban is that UK doesn't include Abu Dhabi, Doha, and Dubai. The home bases of the 3 large middle eastern airlines. Going to really affect business travelers.
Don't really feel like writing any long recaps, but you can add me to the "list" or whatever for: Guatemala Oslo Copenhagen Stockholm Happy to share with anyone headed these places, or thinking about it
Follow up to the above. These are available directly through Delta too so you could use points if available as opposed to only going through Priceline
Using points for flights that cheap isnt a good idea. Rewards redemption doesn't change. If it's 25k a leg, it's 25k a leg. Much better to pay cash
Pretty sure next big trip is going to be spain/portugal so looked up cost to get from Barcelona to Mallorca, one way ticket for $17. That's just insane, would be awesome if US carriers had flights that cheap.
I had no idea how accessible mallorca was. There are direct flights there from literally every major city in Europe and a lot of them are super cheap. Barcelona is so close to mallorca that flights probably like 45 minutes. There's a ferry too that takes a while but sailing the med on the way to mallorca sounds cool
Have a trip booked to Argentina/Chile this summer. Spending 4 days in BA, 3 days in Mendoza, and 3 days in Santiago. Have plenty of good recs for first two stops but would love some good activity/restaurant picks in Santiago. TIA.
Last day in Pokhara, night bus to Kathmandu this evening. Then rent a bike and drive to Nagarkot, about 1 hour east, for a day or two. Catch a flight to Bangkok for a refresher before 2 weeks in Myanmar. Been living in hostels for the better part of a month, have a 5 star hotel booked in Bangkok for 2 nights. Can't. Fucking. Wait. I enjoyed India more than Nepal, but Pokhara is really, really dope. Paragliding over the Himalayas in about 45 minutes.
Currently in Europe (Paris) and looking at visiting Copenhagen and/or Stockholm for a few nights. Please talk me into or out of this. Please note that I don't have any extreme cold weather clothing and am on a backpackers budget. I'll be in Brussels and Amsterdam over the next six days, then no plans. Thanks.
Also, does anyone have advice for Germany? Shitty hostel wifi makes it a bit tougher to do research. My friend told me to stay away from Frankfurt and that Munich is so-so. She suggested a bunch of other small towns, but I'm not that comfortable in taking her suggestions into account. Any help would be appreciated.
Berlin. So much cool stuff to do there. Museums, historical sites, restaurants, bars, etc. Rugen island is cool too, it has nice beaches and stuff but it's too cold for that right now. There's tons of cool castles and stuff. I went to Wartburg which is near Eisenach, which is also the location of Bach House and Luther House. I can add more info later
not sure what you define "extreme" cold as, but the entire week I was in the three cities they were actually warmer than NYC (my home). I don't know if that's an oddity or fairly common. I know tourism really kicks back into earnest around right now for all three, so I'm guessing you'll make it there. Plus if you feel like shopping, Stockholm especially is awesome for outdoor/winter clothing. I don't think it'll be dramatically colder than Paris is right now, but obviously you'd want to check the forecast. If you're on a really tight budget, stick to countries with the Euro and maybe skip these cities. I had no problem finding good (really good) places to eat for $10-15, but you do have to do your research. Scandinavia is notoriously expensive for eating out, although the dollar's surge in the last couple of years has really made it much better. If you just want to stumble into places without doing your homework, it'll be expensive and probably dodgy. Accommodations are generally cheap this time of year, that's a part of the reason I went (extremely cheap airfare and BnB prices). Copenhagen and Stockholm are both very rich, very posh. Copenhagen is a bit like Amsterdam, too (EVERYONE bicycles—it's wild to see on the streets). Places like Freetown Christiania are trippy as fuck and such an interesting thing to see in the middle of a major city. Copenhagen is very young (tons of students from all over Europe) and seemingly had the best nightlife. If you like Paris or London, Stockholm feels very similar. Really I wouldn't say Scandinavia is that much different than the places you're in currently or planning to go, BUT they are remarkable cities culturally (the Nordic system, cohesive, everyone is extremely kind and polite, etc). The Vasa Museum was one of the coolest things I've ever seen, and I say that while generally not being one for classically "touristy" things. Both are huge hotspots for New Nordic cuisine, which is all the rage right now, and the coffee culture. You obviously have to be willing to spend the money for the fancy dinners, but I'll just mention that as another reason people tend to visit Copenhagen and Stockholm, specifically. Anything else I can help with?
This is great. Thanks a bunch. I'm leaving for Brussels now then on to Amsterdam. I'm going to look at staying in Copenhagen for a few nights. I'm not on the tightest of budgets, but I'm backpacking around the world more or less, so I'd like to keep things relatively cheap so I don't have to cut my trip short. I wanted to check out Stockholm to creep on the Swedish women and see if they live up to the reputation, but I can hold that off for another trip.
Rode a motorbike (first time getting a semi-real bike rather than a scooter) out of Kathmandu and up to Nagarkot today. Holy shit was it awesome, was flying. Was nuts getting out of Kathmandu. Nagarkot is incredible. Really tiny mountain town NE of Kathmandu. Last night in Nepal, waking up for what is supposed to be a "life changing sunrise" over the Himalayas from way up here.
Found a company that does a doors off helicopter ride over the Na Poli coast (where they filmed Jurassic Park). Sign me up. From my research there are so many killer hikes in Kauai. Kalalau Trail is king (think I'm going to pass on 22 total miles of hiking), but damn there's so many other great hikes. God bless the Chase Sapphire, all we're going to have to pay for is hotels and food and any excursions.
From what I experienced the Nordic women rank Denmark>Finland>Sweden>Norway. Was a bit disappointed by Sweden. Plenty of hot women of course, but I expected hot blondes everywhere and that wasn't the case. The women in Copenhagen on the other hand, were incredible.