Tag: maps

Seoul: Days 5-6 summary

It seems with each passing day I saw fewer and fewer sights each day…

Day 6:

  • Dongdaemun gate/market/design plaza and fashion district: market overload and it wasn’t even in full swing (busier as a night market!).
    The Dongdaemun Design Plaza’s contest-winning design is a Gehry-esque fluid building and green space designed by an award-winning female Iraqi architect
  • Enjoyed a nice grilled fish lunch (W6000/$5), where the big water bottle on the table was “Kirkland Signature” (i.e. Costco!)
  • Worked for a few hours :-(
  • Kalbi dinner (beef on a table top charcoal grill) with the hostel owner Mr. Kim and one staff member.

Day 5:

  • Inwangsan (mountain): hike up the 338m for shamanist shrines (part way up), old castle city walls and views of Seoul (south towards old part of town and Seoul Tower)
  • Dongnimmun Park with the Independence gate and park
  • Gyeongbokgung (palace): huge grounds with lots of buildings. too many beyond the first few… also a colourful changing of the guards ceremony at the top of each hour during the day.
  • Pork grill on table top hotplate with the hostel owner Mr. Kim, 3 staff and a few guests (going away dinner for a Canadian guy who stayed there for a month)

Also updated the map.

Seoul: Quick 4 day summary

Here’s what I’ve seen so far (more details to follow):

Day 4 (sunny but c-c-c-cold!):

  • 63 City (tower): good views of Seoul from the south bank of the Han River
  • Leeum Samsung Museum: a few interesting pieces in a cool trio of buildings
  • N Seoul Tower: better views of Seoul (around sunset)
  • Namdaemun Night Market: only a quick walk-through the main street as not much was open on Sunday
  • Silloam Fomentation Sauna: hot tubs too, so even better than the Turkish Bath (plus much cheaper and lots of facilities!

Day 3:

  • Changdeokgung (palace) and Secret Garden: the latter was even more impressive than the World Heritage listed palace, especially with fall foliage!
  • Yongsan Electronics Market: overwhelming!
  • Itaewon: the foreigner district (saw 4 Turkish döner shops!)

Day 2:

  • DMZ tour: very interesting! (long day from 7:30 to 15:30)
  • Cheong-gye-chon (stream) stroll: lantern festival

Day 1:

  • Bukchon Hanok Village: scenic traditional houses in neighbourhood near little art galleries
  • Traditional Korean meal in a resto on main Insa-dong road
  • War Memorial Museum: overkill! But the turtle boat replica was cool
  • Dinner at Gwangjang Market: small market with small food section
  • Went to JUMP show: fun comedic martial arts show

Also updated the map.

Seoul: First impressions

Subway: super convenient, efficient, easy (English on signs), cheap (less than a $1 per ride), clean and goes everywhere! Impressive!
Food: tasty and cheap (both street vendors and small restos)
People: lots of them. Mostly looking at their smart phones. But friendly.
Weather: cool. High of 12 C / 54 F. And going to get colder.
DMZ Tour: very interesting (and I got to step into North Korea, inside a little building).
See map in progress

More on everything tomorrow.

Istanbul: Day 3 Summary – Asian side

(I thought I’d get more blogging done tonight, but I got side-tracked reading up on Turkey tips, shopping and scams, as I believe 2 guys were setting me up for the “let’s have a drink scam” tonight, which I politely declined as I sipped a çay (tea) this evening on a bench between the Aya Sofya and the Blue Mosque, both of which are lit up at night)

Today was Sunday and a muslim holiday, so the city was quieter than usual.

Partly due to another late start, the only things I managed to see were:

  • Walked through Gülhane Park next to Topkapi Palace
  • Peeked inside the Istanbul train station, where the Oriental Express used to terminate
  • Took a ferry to Kadiköy on the Asian side, and after a bus ride, back from Üsküdar
    Admittedly I didn’t explore much, but the Asian side was a little disappointing, i.e. it didn’t feel like Asia or particularly different, besides the lack of historical sights; though it did have a fine view back at European side of Istanbul
    Side note: there are in fact two bridges across the Bosphorous linking the continents (one visible from old town), and they are currently building a tunnel as well.
  • Süleymaniye mosque
  • Aqueduct of Valens (large ruins of an aqueduct)
  • Tried some roasted chestnuts (better than I expected)
  • Caved and had a Starbucks latte for TL5/US$3
  • Walked at least 7km today (and no blisters!)

I wanted to take a ferry up the Golden Horn (Haliç), but when I arrived at the terminal it was almost an hour until the next ferry.

I’ve noticed that you can get a döner for as little as TL1.5/$0.86, or as little as TL2/$1.15 with an ayran (yoghurt drink).

There was a kerfuffle at (included) breakfast this morning, which goes from 8:30 to 10:30am. I showed up at 9:45am and the mini buffet was put away! The surly woman simply said “breakfast over!” There were several of us who complained to the front desk guy who argued with her, then put the breakfast stuff back out for the 8 of us (by that time) who would have missed out.

And of course I updated my Istanbul map

Map of India and my stops

Map of my India trip
note that some town names in my “flags” will have slightly different spelling (due to new and old names), but if it sounds close, it’s the same :-)

Here is the list of places I visited (with state name for the first time entering a state):

Leaving for the airport in an just over an hour

What a temperature change this will be: from a hi/lo of -7/-12°C (feels like -14 with the windchill!) in Toronto to a hi/lo of 30/22°C in Chennai, in the southeast of India. You can check out weather in Chennai, India at weather underground.
I still haven’t planned much, but now I’m considering flying to the Andaman Islands (1000km east in the Indian Ocean, south of Burma, but still part of India) and back to Chennai.

Update: here is a map of the path I ended up taking through India.

Leaving for India in just under a week!

I finally bought my ticket yesterday, and I’ll be leaving for India in less than a week, on Mon Jan 21!
I still have lots to do to get ready…

Updates:

See map of my India trip (made after the fact)

Exchange rate at time of trip:
Indian Rupee (INR)
INR 1 = US$ 0.0256147
US$ 1 = INR 39.04
(update: as of mi-Dec 2011, the exchange rate is US$ 1 = INR 52.74, i.e. the rupee has gone down 25% in value vs the dollar in 3.5 years)