Day 1-2 (30th - 31st Aug): Sydney to South Korea to London
With no lost passports or boarding we finally left Australia to begin this year's big trip.
Although we left Sydney at 9:30am and arrived in Seoul at 7pm for the first leg of the trip, the plane inexplicably asked passengers to close all window shutters and, for the whole trip, had the lights down as if it were night. Very weird. I spent the whole time watching, and enjoying, Korean movies.
10 hours after leaving Sydney we arrived at Incheon airport.
With a 17hr overnight layover, we had originally decided we would just camp at the airport but the call to explore a tiny patch of the outside world of Korea was just too much. After enjoying the sights of Arrivals in a very modern airport, we took a 15 min train ride to a suburb(?) called Unseo where we wandered around until we found a popular little spot up a side street for a meal. We both obviously enjoyed our food. Pete completely finished his Beef Bone Broth with Dumplings and, after the initial delivery of a literally boiling dish, I enjoyed my spicy beef and vegetable noodles in beef bone broth.
Like Japan and Singapore, night-time here sees an incredible display of neon signs! Plainly obvious too was the Christian influence in Korea.
After more exploring, we decided to spend a night in a hotel here rather than camping at the airport. What choices!
We didn't regret our choice to stay at Unseo. The good night’s sleep provided by the hotel bed was greatly appreciated and, staying away from airport meant we could do a little more exploring. Our breakfast was a very Korean version of sushi and a yoghurty sort of drink.
We found a lovely park nearby and explored around it.
We saw a few cool ideas that would be useful in Australia. One was an umbrella to stand under while you are waiting to cross at traffic lights. The other was a public insect spray dispenser for a public space where mosquitoes could be a potential problem. With this tiny taste of South Korea, we have decided we will need to return.
Our flight to London from Seoul was a long 14 hours and by the time we landed, waited (and waited) for our baggage to appear, caught a train and walked to our accommodation, we had been up for 23 hours! However, as we arrived at night, it was easy to just go to bed - well after catching up over a cuppa with our friend Leanne from Wooli who has been over in England for a year.
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