It was back to our early morning routine again, with a wake-up call at 5:15 AM so that we could be out of the hotel by 6:15 and on our way to Jeju Airport. Out flight back to Seoul was for 8:30, but when we got to the airport they said they had room on the 7:30 flight and wondered if we would like to take that one instead. Since it would save us an hour of waiting in the airport, we said, "Sure" and hustled down to get on board.

We got back to Seoul and headed back to the Hilton. We checked in and were right back in the same room that we had left before going to Jeju. Once we had dropped off our baggage, we headed down for brunch, since we hadn't eaten anything yet today. Brunch was very good (the buffet here at the Hilton is the best one we have seen the whole trip), and we managed to stuff ourselves pretty well.

With our full bellies, we decided that we needed a brief nap before heading out for some exploration of Seoul. Ninety minutes later we were out the door and heading to Changdeokgung Palace. Well actually, we were heading to the Bukchon Traditional Village, but on our way there we decided to go to the palace instead, as it is closed tomorrow and we can do the village then.

The Palace was huge and very similar in construction to many of the palaces and temples that we saw in Japan. After looking at a few of the buildings, we headed for the large gardens that account for 60% of the Palace grounds. In order to get into the garden area, you have to join a tour, but at this time of day the only tour that was left was a Korean one. We joined anyway thinking that we could just figure it out for ourselves, but at the first stop, a guy from Australia approached us and told us that his Korean friend was translating for them and asked if we wanted to join them for the rest of the tour! This helped us immeasurably, and we chatted with the three of them (the Australian guy's wife was with them as well) the rest of the tour. The gardens of the palace were very cool, with lots of places where the King would apparently go-to drink and relax with his ministers and friends. One of them even had a place where he could sleep if he was too drunk to make it back to his usual bed!

After the Palace, we decided to head to the Bukchon Village, but there was something lost in the discussion we had with the taxi driver, and we instead ended up at Namsangol Korean Traditional Village. This actually turned out to be a bit of a bonus, as after a quick walk through the small traditional village, we sat down and watched about 45 minutes of a music/arts concert. The first part was a mix of what appeared to be a Latin American group with some Korean drummers. It was ok, but when the Latin band left and just the Korean drummers came back out, it was much better. They were pounding the drums for all they were worth. It was amazing! Two of them also did some small comedy type bits with the audience, first with metal drums and then while spinning disks on sticks. It was fairly amusing.

After we had heard enough of the music, we decided to wander our way back to the hotel and try and find something to eat. We ended up in the Myeongdong shopping district. We explored it for a while and ended up finding a traditional Korean restaurant where we were able to have Bibimbap, Pulgoki, and a Korean Pancake. They were all quite good (if a little on the spicy side for Christine & her mom), and left us nice and full as we headed back to the hotel for bed.

Tomorrow is another exploration day, and Tuesday is our trip to the DMZ!