Days 9 and 10 (June 1st and June 2nd in Seoul)

We didn't really do much on the 1st.  It was our down day again.  It was just last minute shopping at Namdaemun.  I did buy a lot though, for very reasonable prices.  I came back with half of the money I brought (not just to spend, but food, subway, everything).  Kaelin did not want a hanbok this time, so I got one for Jaemin and Chelsi.  Jaemin's has deer on it, so it's very manly.  Chelsi's has a beautiful butterfly on the back and is beautiful as well.  I actually found a lady who sold them for less than what I paid 4 years ago and I love them.  We also finished up the rest of what we wanted to bring home.

Then, came Sunday when I broke one of my celadon bowls.  I just about cried.  I knew we wouldn't have much time to go back to Insadong because we were spending the day with Jared, Jane, Val, Tim, Conner and Bailey.  We had plans to go Seoul Tower and the Korean War Memorial.  But, we got it all in.  We managed to do what we had planned and then the moms got off a the subway a couple of stops early to walk to Insadong and back to the hotel (and Jane found the shop to get my replacement bowl....whew!).  Tim and Brian took all of the kids a little further on the subway, back to the hotel to swim.  We were all so exhausted by that night.

We walked from our drop off in Myeongdong to the Oreumi elevator....not too far.  Then, the elevator (hard to explain) took us to the cable car platform.  The cable car then took us to the bottom of the tower.  There, we were able to see over Seoul, put our lock with all of the other (probably million) locks and go into the tower.  You ride an express elevator to the top that takes maybe a few minutes to go all the way up, as smooth as butter!  From the top, you can see the entire city if you walk around the circle and realize just how big and beautiful it is.  We had lunch at Cold Stone Creamery after the tower...it was right there, hot and ice cream sounded REALLY good!

After the tower we went to the subway to get a little closer to the Korean War Memorial.  We pretty much stayed outside since all of the boys were interested in the tanks, planes, missiles, etc.  I brought Kaelin, Chelsi and Bailey inside for a minute.  You walk outside a long walkway full of names of SK soldiers who died in action and plaque listing each country by numbers who died.  SK was in the hundreds of thousands and then the US about 30,000+.  It's a very quiet peaceful area inside to remember what happened and is technically still going on because of North Korea's constant actions.  The artwork and creativity in Seoul is amazing and beautiful.  I've seen some of the prettiest places there that I've ever seen in my life and I have traveled enough to say that now.

We really enjoyed spending the day with our friends and Brian had a guy to talk Cardinals all day with him.  I was a little disappointed it took me until the last day to realize that our hotel had a shuttle that left at 10:30 and had drop offs at certain areas, so we could have had a free ride every single day.  We took that shuttle to the Myeongdong drop off to walk to the tower and it was perfectly convenient.

Walking to and in Namdaemun with Chase and Kaelin.

Waiting for the Oreumi Elevator to the Cable Car Station at Seoul Tower.

 

 Old friends meet again.

Views from elevator.

Onto the cable car.

From the bottom of the tower.

 The sword is real and really big!

 Waiting to go up in the tower.

 More waiting to go up in the tower.

The locks.....we added our family's lock as well.

 Our lock!

The view from the tower top is amazing!

 That close to North Korea. 

 That far away from Chicago where we flew out.

Jaemin and I in front of the locks.