I made it!

Well, after over 40 hours of traveling, I made it to my hotel in Korea! 🙂

This is just going to be a quick post since I am totally EXHAUSTED!

I left the house at 0400 yesterday, left Houston at 0730. I made it to Washington DC with barely enough time to catch that flight. Flew from there to Beijing (China). Again, I had just barely enough time to catch my next flight (and I never would have made it if I hadn’t asked to cut ahead and go in the ‘fast track’ line).

If you ever go through China, be sure to put ALL your cords in a separate bag. I have no idea why, but the security wants to see all your electrical cords (phone cords, camera chargers, kindle chargers, computer cords, etc). It delayed me quite a bit digging all that out! Oh yeah, they don’t like cigarette lighters there either (they confiscated mine).

So I got to Korea (Inchon airport for Seoul) at about 1830 tonight. I had an easy time getting out of the airport. It was all very modern, English signs for everything, information booths everywhere.

I decided to take the airport train into town. I had to get a transportation pass first. I asked the lady at the tourist information booth at the airport and she was very helpful. I got a pass for 10,000 won. It should last me for a couple of days at least and I can charge it up when I need to. I ‘think’ she told me it was good all over the country, city bus, metro, etc.

Easy enough to take the train into town. I can’t beleive how helpful everyone was! I found the train at the airport and started talking to a Korean man who was just coming home from working in Japan. He helped me figure out which stops I would have to get off and transfer. He even gave me a bag of chocolates from Japan!

I made the first transfer OK, but the 2nd one was a little more difficult. Lucky I only brought fairly small roller wheeled luggage! This station had stairs, stairs and more stairs and no elevators (at least that I could find). A very nice lady helped me, she just grabbed one of my bags and started walking up the stairs.

The tourist information lady had called my hotel for me so she could tell me how to get there (which was what I had originally asked about there), they said I would spot it right away when I came out of the station. OK, I wandered around for an hour and saw no sign of it.

I tried asking people. No one had any idea. One very nice man called them for me. Turns out, I had exited the wrong side of the train station. He took it upon himself to make sure I found the place and led me back through the train station (NOT as simple as it sounds, it’s a maze)! He had the lady from the hotel meet us at the door coming out of the station.

Wow! What amazingly helpful people! I got to the hotel and the lady gave me my key and right away showed me my cute little room and where everything was. It’s called the Fox Hotel and now that I’ve seen it, I have to say it’s really a pretty good deal.

It’s small, but it’s cute and it has everything I need. There’s a little fridge, with bottled water and cans of coffee and something I haven’t figured out yet. It has a picture of a lady in a cornstalk on it. Any clues?

I’ll be here in Incheon for a couple of days. I think then I’ll head down towards Busan. I haven’t really decided yet. Maybe I’ll learn something while I’m wandering around here tomorrow to give me some ideas. 😉

 

0 thoughts on “I made it!

  1. Capt Jill you are awesome!! I love your blogs!!! And I love that you are all over the world!! It feels like I’m right there with you on your Journeys keep them coming!! 🙂

    • Thanks Big Dave! I love to travel and go off somewhere every chance I get! It seems like it’s been a long time since I’ve been anywhere really interesting. I’ve been looking forward to this trip for a while. I’m glad you’re enjoying reading about my adventures. 🙂

  2. Hope you are now well rested, and ready for your next adventure. Have a great time! Am looking forward to your posts about Korea. I’ve never been there, but hope to visit some day. Keep up the great writing!

    • Thanks Penny! I’m still a little worn out, but I did finally get out of the hotel this morning and wandered off to find something interesting. I wanted to go see Chinatown,I thought it would be interesting to see if they were any different in Korea. Nope, not really. I think the one we have in San Fransisco is bigger and better.
      I wandered all over and found a park, Jayu Park, with a big statue of General MacArthur. It was very pretty with all the flowers and the trees blooming everywhere and the petals falling down. I walked all over. I was trying to find the fish market to take pictures, but I never got that far. I just got too tired after walking for 4-5 hours already. I broke down and took a cab to Wolmido Island where they have some sort of amusement park. I hung out there for a while, watched the sun set over the water and watching the ships go by (;-)), I finally called it a day and made my way back to my hotel. Staying one more night here in Incheon and then moving on to Busan. 🙂

    • I haven’t met many people that speak English here either, but I don’t know ANY Korean, so they do much better than I do to even figure out what I’m trying to ask them. I did get pretty good at sign language and drawing pictures when I was on the tuna boat. No one spoke Englsh on there either and I had to work with them for 3 months at a time!
      Yes, it’s definitely worth spending some time here. 🙂

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