K2 Motel, Busan

It was the weekend of Buddha’s birthday and prices for everywhere seemed to double and in some cases treble for weekend rates.

We finally came across the K2 motel using agoda.com

On the Agoda website you can see all the themed rooms. We opted for a double deluxe as it was only an extra W10,000 a night and it included a jacuzzi tub.

The room was really clean, with a huge TV and PC and the TV had a USB slot so we could watch our own movies on it.

I’m definitely going to continue to opt for motels over hotels in the future. Apart from the seedy reputation, these rooms are about a third of the price of a hotel and far more entertaining!

Getting There: 

We took the KTX to Busan Station and from there the orange line north to Beomnaegol Station. Exit 7 and it’s right around the corner.

Gonjiam Psychiatric Hospital (정신병원 곤지암 )

I stumbled across this place when I was looking for interesting places to visit in Korea. It came up on CNN’s most scariest places on earth list. Being a huge fan of American Horror Story’s “Asylum”, I had to try and visit this place that technically isn’t a tourist attraction.

Gonjiam Psychiatric Hospital supposedly closed down suddenly around 1996 when people started dying mysteriously. The owner abandoned the place and apparently went to America, leaving the place as it was.

After a lot of Google mapping and searching on Naver.com, I found the location of the hospital. Unfortunately it is totally closed off to the public, with a large amount of barbed wire around it and signs discouraging people from entering.

There really is an eerie feel to the place, even though apparently several people visit this place each year to take a look and there’s plenty of evidence of that with graffiti and broken windows. However, a large amount of furniture and bits and pieces are still strewn about the place which does give a hint of what the place used to be like almost twenty years ago.

An old lab coat propped up on something.

Getting There: 

The 1113-1 bus goes from Seoul and the stops are marked on the map below. It goes directly to Gonjiam,  It’s a  ten – fifteen minute walk just outside the town Gonjiam.

Please note that this is not a tourist attraction. 

Cherry Blossom South Korea

The Cherry Blossom Festival takes place every year in spring time in Seoul… 

Hwaseong Fortress, Suwon

I headed here last Sunday with a couple of friends. I knew nothing about it but needed a good excuse to get out in the good weather and do something cultural.

The fortress was built around the late 1700s and it’s walls run through the city Suwon itself. Apparently it was built to honor the remains of a Prince whose father was buried alive because he refused to commit suicide… not sure how accurate Wikipedia is but the full article can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hwaseong_Fortress

I wasn’t expecting the several steps to reach the top, nor did I expect there to be any sort of incline but I have to say, once I got to the top I was really glad I did and realistically it only took about 20-30 minutes..

It was a great time of year to go as there were plenty of great photo opportunities too.

Getting There:

Take the subway to Suwon. There was a tourist information booth just outside of the subway with the leaflet for the fortress. We took a bus (can’t remember the number this time but they told us at the information place) and it was about 4/5 stops away so not impossible to walk on foot on a nice day by any means.