Seoul South Korea, a messy travel diary

Like every year, I’m going to attempt and fail miserably at being a lifestyle/ travel blogger with a travel diary without any addresses or useful information to prepare your trip to Seoul! This post is basically just a ton of pictures. You really want to click to read it now, don’t you? wink

I think it’s safe to say that I will never be contacted by any travel agency or tourism information office with this kind of intro… lol!
I just really, really wanted to share a few (OK, a ton!) of photos from my trip to Seoul, South Korea last month.

I fell in love with Seoul. With my husband, we stayed three weeks in this beautiful city and it was the first time we went there. I was super curious to discover Seoul and to dive into another culture.
This trip was, therefore, a total immersion in a super exciting city, which was very different from what I knew so far!

My desire to go to Seoul may have been connected to my huge passion for everything related to beauty and cosmetics. Indeed, this city is literally the Mecca of cosmetics. Right now, all the beauty trends begin there and the Korean beauty market is at least 5 to 10 years ahead of the rest of the world. I will have the opportunity to talk about in more detail it in the coming months because, as you can imagine, I didn’t leave empty-handed. We flew with Emirates to go there and their baggage allowance is one of the most generous in the world so I took full advantage of it!

This article is already long enough, so I will probably write a second post on the various shopping spots I discovered in Seoul, as well as all the beauty trends I saw there. So stay tuned! wink

Obviously, I also really wanted to visit the city itself. Seoul is full of very different and quite distinctive districts, which are the perfect places for long walks!
In three weeks, we really had the time to walk around and discover the city at our own pace.

While I was there, I shared a maximum on Instagram and I also shot a lot of stories during the trip. I downloaded all of them on my phone and this stupid device found nothing better than to do than freeze when I was on the plane to Dubai, on the way back and I had to wipe everything which was inside to be able to use it again -_-) (I can’t get over it, I’m gutted!).
But luckily, I also took a lot of photos during this trip! wink

Seoul is often described as the perfect balance between tradition and modernity and even if it is a bit cliché to say that, it remains a fair description of the city. Many of the tourist attractions are located right in the heart of the city. It was quite funny to see centuries-old palaces next to ultra-modern buildings!

I’m gonna be honest, this post isn’t really a complete travel diary with all the places we visited, because we didn’t really have a very strict schedule (it wouldn’t have bothered me but my dear husband is allergic to it lol) so I had a few places in mind that I absolutely wanted to see but we also did a lot of random walks in the city, without really knowing where we were. I sometimes had my camera with me, but not always.

So here is a small glimpse of our Seoul walks! (lol, there are still more than twenty pictures in this post ^^)

Namsan Park and the N Tower:

We took the cable car to get to the Namsan tower and we walked for hours in this huge park in the middle of the city. It’s the ideal place to take panoramic pictures of Seoul (and also to get eaten alive by mosquitoes as we found out later).

The tradition of key lockers for lovers made it to Seoul, and look at all these bright colors! Apparently, this place right next to the N Tower is a cult spot for K-drama fans but I confess that I don’t know anything about it at all so I can’t really confirm it. wink

We didn’t visit the inside of the N Tower because the presence inside of a Hello Kitty coffee was too much for my dear husband ^^

The Seoul palaces, Gyeongdong and the Secret Garden in Changdeokgung:

I loved that some tourists were dressed in traditional outfits to visit the Seoul palaces! You can indeed rent a traditional outfit for the day and it makes great photos souvenirs.

Of course, as a good western tourist, I didn’t do it, but the tourists who did it looked amazing and fit perfectly inside the pretty palaces!

(I’m ashamed, but I looked more like these two old guys behind than those two pretty girls during the visits #definitelynotafashionblogger )

Bukchon Hanok village:

Buckchon is a village with traditional houses located in the middle of the city and believe it or not, these houses are still inhabited. I would have loved to be a little mouse to be able to slip inside and take a look! smile

Ihwa Mural village:

I loved walking around in Ihwa, with its adorable street art murals on every street corner. It’s a very popular place for young Seoulites who come to make photo shoots, probably destined to their Instagram accounts. I tried to do the same but clearly, I will never be a fashion blogger because again, I looked like a basic tourist! wink

Dongdaemun Design Plaza/ DDP (by night):

Dongdaemun is the fashion district in Seoul, there are a lot of buildings there full of clothes, fabrics, sewing accessories… and it’s also where you can find the DDP, this great architectural complex that organizes exhibitions and fashion shows during the Seoul Fashion Week.
We went there at night because we wanted to see this incredible field of illuminated roses, located just next to it. It was very impressive and poetic!

The Han river:

And to end the tour, nothing better than a romantic sunset on the Han river!

The only problem now is that I really want to go back to Seoul!

I’ll do a second post more focused on cosmetics and beauty shops in Seoul and of course, I also plan to do full reviews of the gems I found there! smile

And you, have you ever been to Seoul? What were your favorite areas in the city?

Photo credit: bonnie-garner.com