Seoul and Jeju-do island, South Korea

My wife and I spent about 2 weeks visiting Seoul and Jeju-do island, South Korea. We've been to Seoul many times and visited most of the tourist sites so I didn't take pictures of Seoul other than the food we ate. So I apologize for not having Seoul attraction pictures. But I do have some of Jeju-do island since the last time I visited the island was like 18 years ago. Jeju-do is considered Hawaii of Korea and it's popular destination for Korean honeymoon couples. If you visit South Korea, Jeju-do island is must visit along with Seoul.

1) Pictures from Seoul

This is picture of Seodaemun Prison which is famous prison used during Japanese colonial period to imprison Korean liberation activists. After Japanese colonial period ended in 1945 after Japanese WWII surrender, South Korean government continued to use the prison until it was closed in 1987.


One of the first thing we ate in Seoul was KFC, short for Korean Fried Chicken. Kentucky Fried Chicken might be more well known around the world but Koreans have perfected fried chicken and there are like zillion fried chicken places all over Korea and they all deliver even late at night. Nothing better than chicken and beer. Koreans even have name for pairing fried chicken with beer. They call it Chimaek.


And after long night of drinking, breakfast is normally some type of soup. This case it's soybean sprout soup with some eggs and fruit herbal wine.


Koreans love soups and stew. Beef bone broth soup.


Cod fish and egg soup


Pork blood sausage soup


Spicy pork neck and spine potato stew



Braised pork neck and glass noodles


Korean army stew


Hand knife cut noodles with dumpling


But you can't visit Seoul and not eat famous Korean BBQ. Hanwoo is Korean beef. It doesn't have the insane marbling of Japanese Wagyu but it does have great marbling. Many people prefer Korean Hanwoo over Japanese Wagyu because they say the meat has more beefier flavor with better meat to fat ratio. I love Hanwoo beef and think it's one of the best in the world.

My plate of Hanwoo beef with US Angus bone-in short rib mixed in. Left is Hanwoo ribeye and rib fingers, middle is US Angus bone-in short rib, right is Hanwoo brisket. You can clearly see the difference in marbling between Hanwoo and US Angus beef.


Free BBQ banchan (side dishes)


spicy chili fermented raw crab. This was my favorite side dish. All sides are free as are refill. I asked for refill of the crab.


lump charcoal used to cook Korean BBQ. The lump charcoal in Korea is amazing. I wish we could get the Korean lump charcoal in the US.


Grilling Hanwoo beef




Free service bowl of iced buckwheat noodles at the end of the meal to cleanse the palate.


Premium quality lump charcoal on the right and starter briquettes on the left.


Equipment they use to fast light the lump charcoal


Some pork belly BBQ






Lighter and healthier fare. Grilled pork wrap




Some street food. Steamed pork liver, steamed pork blood sausage, spicy rice and fish cakes, fried blood sausage in spicy sauce, and warm anchovy broth to drink.




And some fresh seafood. The fishes on this sashimi plate were swimming in the fish tank 20 minutes prior.


Some more raw fish, oysters, abalone, sea squirt


Free spicy seafood soup made from leftover fish head and bones. Nothing is wasted.


Fresh raw octopus with sesame seed oil.


Next up: Jeju-do island, South Korea

2) Jeju-do island, South Korea.

Jeju island is quick 1 hour flight from Seoul.


Jeju island is nature lover's dream with beautiful oceans, mountains, waterfalls, hiking trails. When we visited, it was mandarin orange harvest season and all the trees were full of mandarin oranges. Unfortunately, I forgot to get even one picture of mandarin orange trees even though it was everywhere on the island!

Rental car is very helpful getting around the island. But in order to rent rental car in South Korea, you do need to get the International Driver's Permit. You must get the IDP while you're in the US. You can get it at any US AAA office for $20 fee.





















Temple







Dol hareubang or rock statue of Jeju island.


One of hundreds of waterfall on Jeju








Next up: Food in Jeju-do island

3) Jeju-do island is known for fresh seafood and black Jeju pig. Jeju Beltfish dish in particular is very famous. Jeju-do is also home to famous female free divers known as haenyeo. These fearless ladies free dive in the ocean with only wet suit and goggles and catch seafood and shellfish along the coast. One of my goal in visiting Jeju was to eat fresh seafood caught by these ladies and I was able to do that.

Hot stone abalone rice breakfast


The rice was flavored with abalone innards and pine nuts, jujube fruit, and other nuts. Really amazing.


Free grilled mackerel banchan that accompanied abalone rice. Unfortunately, no free refill on the grilled mackerel.


Plate of grilled abalone. It was the most tender abalone I've eaten in my life.


Jeju black pig pork belly cooked on cast iron cauldron lid


Fried rice cooked on the cauldron lid to end the pork belly bbq meal


Fresh seafood hot pot dinner




Shellfish caught and sold by Jeju island Haenyeo free divers.


Haenyeo diver ladies preparing my abalone and conch sashimi plate.




And one of the greatest meal I've had in my life. Grilled Jeju beltfish. Everything was so good including all the banchan sides. I ate all the sides and asked for refill. It was terrific.



Some of the delicious free banchan (side dishes) that came with the grilled beltfish meal




soy sauce fermented raw crab


Hot stone abalone rice that came with the beltfish meal. One for each of us.


Our server deboning the entire grilled beltfish for us using only spoon and fork.


Deboned grilled beltfish


My wife and I spent 4 days 3 nights in Jeju-do island and had wonderful time. I wish we could've spent like another 2 days but we plan to visit the island again in the future.

We also visited Taipei, Taiwan, for 5 days and 4 nights but I'm going to cover that in different post.

Titch said:

Awesome Pictorial
I will pass on the Raw Octopus though

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Raw octopus isn't bad if you can get pass the texture. You do have to chew really well since the tentacles suction tend to stick on your tongue and inside your mouth. Suction sensation is weird when that happens.

OferL said:

I enjoyed reading and looking at the wonderful photos. Korean BBQ is a favorite of mine. And Korea is on my to-go list. Your post just drove it higher! thank you!

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I hope you get a chance to visit. It was my second visit to Korea this year. I visited port city of Busan for a week in the Spring.

keeperofsecrets said:

Fabulous post! I envy you this trip and all the wonderful food. Regarding the *freshness* of the seafood...we'd all be in a better place with octopus tentacles than with whatever is used to make McD chicken nuggets.

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Koreans are obsessed with fresh seafood. All the restaurants pretty much keep all the seafood alive in the fish tanks. If you're not used to it, it can kind of shock you first time you see things like abalone and conch moving in the hot pot as it's cooking. But because things are so fresh, the taste is amazing. Personally, I LOVE the food culture in Korea and how cheap everything is for the quality you receive. And there's no tipping which I love.

Norm said:

What a great post Brother!

Thank you for sharing your trip!

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Thanks Norm!

Stingerhook said:

Looks like an epic trip. Thanks for the share.

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It was really fun! It was first trip my wife and I took without our daughter traveling with us. We wouldn't have been able to eat all the delicious seafood if she came with us. She's not a fan of seafood.

ShadowDriver said:

Looks like you folks had an amazing trip! Really appreciate the photos of the sights and the ridiculous food you enjoyed.

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Thanks Marc! We had a blast! We've been home for less than a week and already miss Korea.

Sid Post said:

Absolutely awesome! I may have to add Korea to my 'bucket list'!

How does someone without Korean language skills do in Korea outside of touristy places? Will little 'mom and pop' places outside of the large areas work for someone like me who doesn't know the culture and in addition to the local language?

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To explore Korea properly, it's best to have someone local to show you around.
Korea has so many small side streets and restaurants that's not on Google Maps. In fact, Google Maps is pretty useless in South Korea. Everyone uses Kakao or Naver Maps over there. I used Kakao maps in addition to Google Maps when I was there. But you can just walk around touristy places and near universities where college students hang out. Just follow the crowd and seek out restaurants that are packed. That's usually good advise anywhere.

Most "mom and pop" places outside touristy areas won't have English menu.
But in Korea, restaurants tend to specialize in one or two dishes so ordering won't be too difficult. They will just have menu on the walls.

Like this menu from the seafood hot pot restaurant we ate at.


But even if you can't read or speak the language, it's easy to use Google Translate app and use the translate the picture option to translate in real time using your phone. We ordered the smaller seafood hot pot which was 45,000 Won. That's on the top left corner of the board menu. The larger seafood hot pot was 55,000 Won but that's more for 3-4 people serving. I could've added live octopus to the seafood pot for additional 20,000 Won if I wanted. $1 was equaled to around 1,175 Won when i was there.

This was the menu at hot stone abalone rice restaurant.


You can see they have pictures and English translation underneath. It makes ordering simple. Not all restaurants are like this but like I said, lot of restaurants tend to specialize in only couple dishes.

Here's the menu from the pork belly restaurant in Jeju that used the cast iron cauldron lid.


Again, very simple. Sometimes, the hard part can be trying to figure out the correct way to eat the food. Because for some soups, they leave the seasoning up to the individual. Like this bean sprout soup with rice.


You're supposed to season the soup with the salted shrimp and sliced hot green pepper that's on the dishes next to left of the kimchi. And you're supposed to break apart the roasted seaweed and add it to the soup as well. The roasted seaweed is not in this picture.

Then you're supposed to use your spoon and scoop around 10-15 spoonful of the hot soup liquid and transfer it to the egg dish on the right. Then also add handful of roasted seaweed pieces to the egg and use the spoon to eat the cooked egg.

It's simple if you know what to do and how to eat it but without someone showing you, it's not always obvious how to eat certain foods. But that's what makes it fun. You can always ask the servers how to eat certain foods.

In Korea, there's no tipping and taxes are included in the price. So what you see is what you pay. And at restaurants, you have to be proactive and flag or call the servers if you want something.

Gore said:

Absolutely beautiful! I've visited Korea several times the last three years and it is one of my favorite places to visit. I have never felt more welcomed as an American anywhere. I was on Jeju island last year for a conference. It is a beautiful place, but after a week, it got feeling quite small. The women divers are amazing! One very funny thing happened when we left. We got to the airport about three hours early, with enough time to make the earlier flight. I figured I would ask to see if we could get seats and find out how much it would cost. The RT was only about $100, so figured it wouldn't cost too much extra. The lady said we could get tickets on the earlier flight, but she would need my credit card. Before handing it over, I asked how much extra it would be. She said, "Oh no, the seats on the earlier flight are cheaper. I need your card to refund you the difference." I got about $20 back on a $100 rt ticket, for changing flights. Can you imagine that happening on an American airline.

Anyway, love the food, love the pictures, love everything!

Absolutely the most amazing fried chicken I've had anywhere is in Korea. It is a part of the culture. They go out to dinner, then they go out after for drinking and fried chicken. They usually order a serving (which his quite large) for sharing. When I've gone out, they seem to leave about half the food behind, then go to another place and order more food and chicken. This was hard for me to do and if I didn't do so much walking when I travel, I would definitely gain about 20 pounds per trip.

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Airfare from Seoul to Jeju is really cheap because of all the discount airlines. I paid $43 for my roundtrip ticket on Asiana which is crazy since they're full service airline!

And in Korea, drinking and eating for the evening doesn't stop after the 1st round. There are often 2nd, 3rd, and sometimes even 4th round of eating and drinking when out with friends and colleagues. So you better bring your appetite and be able to hold down your Soju. And I agree with you. Korea has the best fried chicken.

I was going to post the Taipei, Taiwan, on another thread but I think I'll just post it here since it was part of this Korea trip. We chose to go to Taipei from Seoul because we had free open jaw flight with Korean Air. So we traveled and stayed in Taipei for 5 days, 4 nights.

I want to comment about Incheon International Airport in Korea. We flew in and out of Terminal 2 since we flew Korean Air and Incheon airport was the best airport I've had the pleasure of visiting and traveling through. It's on whole another level from any airport in the US and it's worth getting to the airport early so you can spend time exploring it. It's that good. And the Priority Pass lounges at Terminal 2 in Incheon were the best Priority Pass lounges I visited anywhere. The food selection was incredible for lounge, easily like 10 times the selection of lounges in the US and elsewhere. It was hotel or restaurant quality buffet.

Priority lounge at Incheon International Airport







OK. Onward to Taipei, Taiwan.

We flew into Taipei and took the MRT train to our hotel. Taipei had the best metro train system of any city I've visited. The Metro was awesome and so easy to use. We took the subway trains and buses everywhere while in Taipei and never once used taxi or Uber. We took the subway and buses everywhere in Seoul as well but I felt Taipei had the edge in easier to use MRT. But public transit is excellent in both Taipei and Seoul.

After settling in at our hotel, we walked to Ningxia Night Market to eat. Taipei is famous for night markets and there are more than dozen all over the city.




We ate some pork dumplings for around $1.75 and it was pretty good.


I experienced the smell of stinky tofu for the first time at this night market. I'm pretty adventurous person when it comes to food and can pretty much eat anything but the smell of stinky tofu is something else. It's so strong and repulsive that it made me want to gag and really turned my stomach. And that's just from the smell walking pass vendors that were selling it. I couldn't bear to get close enough to take pictures of it. It honestly smelled like strong rotten sewer garbage and piss from uncleaned bathroom toilet. I wanted to try stinky tofu before I got to the night market but after smelling it, I chickened out. I just couldn't get over the awful smell. But I did end up eating it later on the trip. But it was soy sauce marinated stinky tofu at a restaurant rather than fried stinky tofu sold at the night market stalls.

Couple observations about people of Taiwan. Both males and females are tall. I'm 6 ft tall and I saw so many people taller than me. Females were generally very pretty and fit. And I thought Koreans love to eat but Taiwanese might beat them. There were food and places to eat everywhere in Taipei. And food was generally much cheaper in Taipei than in Seoul.

Some attraction pics

Taipei 101. It was the tallest building in the world until completion of Burj Khalifa in Dubai in 2010.


Liberty Square




National Chiang Kai-Shek Memorial Hall




Lungshan Temple






Traditional market next to Lungshan Temple


National Palace Museum




Thermal Valley