A visit to Busan - Day 1

If you've been following along with our Korean Adventure, you may or may not have noticed that most everything I've already posted about has been in or around Seoul. Well, we finally got the chance to do some traveling a little further away and spent four days in Busan, South Korea.

Busan is the second largest city in South Korea - it's a port city about 325 km, or 200 miles, from Seoul on the southeastern coast.  For this trip we opted to try Korail's express train system (KTX) for the first time - a straight trip of 2 1/2 hours from 

Seoul Station to Busan Station.

We had the essentials packed and hopped on the subway for a quick ride to the train station for our tickets. 

 Easy to navigate and pretty darn big.

We enjoyed a nice leisurely morning ride, left the city behind, and actually got to see some green farm land along the way!

Once we arrived in Busan, we had to stretch our legs and pause for a train photo op:

Instead of heading right to our hotel, we opted to use the handy-dandy lockers at the subway station to stow our luggage so we could walk around and enjoy the great weather.  We hopped on the subway for a 2-stop ride to Nampo-dong, where we grabbed a quick lunch of Seolleongtang, a simple beef and noodle soup, at the Seoul Kakkdugi restaurant - yum!

Then we headed up the nearby 5-story escalator to Yongdusan Park.  I was so happy to see these covered escalators - until I remembered afterwards that I would still have to walk back down - my poor aching knee was not happy with me!

 

At the top was a beautiful bell, a statue of Admiral Yi Sun-Sin, and the Busan Tower.

From the top of the tower we enjoyed a panoramic view of the city and took these awesome pictures:

Yongdusan Park

Bukhang Bridge and the port

Lotte Mall 

 Jagalchi Fish Market

We also found these fun items along out trek to the tower:

Weeeee!

After a few hours, we decided it was time to head towards Haeundae Beach and our hotel - we weren't in a rush, so we rode the subway from Busan Station to Haeundae Station (not a bad ride; just a bit long), and then we had to walk our bags from the station.  Guess who took a cab back to the train station on the way home?  :)

Pretty empty (awesome!), one week after the "season" ended

We stayed at the Haeundae Grand Hotel - not far from the beach and was a good deal on Agoda (especially since this was now considered the "off season").

 

We checked in, scoped out the room, and got settled in.

The mini bar, where a small bottle was 14,000 won ($14) and 

a toothbrush was 4,400 won ($4.40).

Just in case you forgot to bring your underwear...his and hers 

were available to purchase.

Ah, the simple life (and the ability to sleep on the floor with no ill effects at a young age).

Finally it was time for the beach, which made our 

very impatient four-year old extremely happy!

We finished the night with some Korean BBQ at a nearby restaurant and then rested up for day 2 in Busan.  Here is a glimpse of the neon lights visible from our room.

To be continued...
Busan Day 2

Busan Day 3

Busan Day 4