Namsan Tower

I'm sorry that I've been on such a hiatus. I've been doing a lot in the last few months and I want to bring you some of the highlights. First: Namsan Tower. Namsan Tower is the Seattle Space Needle of Seoul. It's a tall skinny building/structure on top of a hill in the middle of Seoul. It allows you 360 degree views of the city. It was on my list of places to visit and in mid-April I went with my friend/fellow teacher Laura.

To get to the base of the tower your options are taking the cable car, the bus, or hiking/walking up the mountain. Laura wanted to hike so we did. I'm using the word hike loosely here because it was more like sets and sets of stairs. Here's how it looked "hiking":



The weather was perfect for our adventure. When you finish climbing all the stairs (I definitely had to take a couple breaks) you get to the top where the tower is. Even without going up into the tower itself there are amazing views to be had from up there. Here's a picture of the tower from the platform:

Before we went up in the tower we walked around. At Namsan there's a long fence that couples attach locks too. It's a fun tradition; couples will go and "lock up" their love at Namsan. For all of the couple things that I think are over the top here, I thought this one was kind of sweet. It was overwhelming to see all of the locks. They even had a box to throw away the keys.

I liked that underneath the new plastic locks you could see old metal ones rusting with age.

Seoul in the background.



After we looked at all the locks we walked around the platform. In the gift shop there was a wall where couples could buy tiles to write on in addition to the locks.

Those pictures that you see on the tiles are big in Korea. There are little shops you can go into and take those pictures then doctor them with hearts, stars, cat whiskers, etc. So cute (Korea's motto). Finally, after a full dose of couples and love, we went up into the tower. Here are some pictures of Seoul from the top.

It was really amazing seeing Seoul from the top of the tower. I've visited so many neighborhoods in Seoul but I never really had an idea of where they were in relation to each other. It was cool being able to figure it out. Afterwards Laura and I were even confinent enough that we decided to walk down the mountain to a neighborhood called Itawon that we've been to many times. Itawon is the foreigners district. We definitely took the long way, but we successfully made it there. It was nice to end the day in a cute little bar drinking amazing drinks. Of course, I have to share those too :)

The bar was called Bermuda Triangle

 A mojito and Kiwi makgeolli (a Korean rice wine)