i've got soul but i'm not a solider {Seoul, South Korea}

 Hong Kong Disneyland is still closed on Tuesdays and Thursdays, so when we given two days off in a row, it's sort of gold these days that must be taken advantage of. We had hoped when we came out in 2020 that we would be able to visit Seoul, South Korea during our time here. We did eventually get there, it just took 3 year to make it happen. Because we only had two days off, we were only going to have about 30 hours to actually explore all we wanted to see in Seoul, and with that, the adventure began. We left at midnight on Sunday evening and took the 3.5 hour flight to Seoul. 

We tried to sleep on the flight, but there were a lot of announcements and even a meal delivered at like 2am. We finally arrived in Seoul around 7am, and headed to our airbnb to drop our bags off for the day. 
The room was a tiny kitchen area, bathroom, and the stairs (which were more of a ladder) to get to a little loft area, with some very, very basic bedding. It was fine for when we actually went to sleep cause we were absolutely exhausted, but it was not a nice cushy stay, but worked for our very quick trip.There was a cute little rooftop, which we spent all of 1 minute to check out, but the view of the city was beautiful. After dropping our bags, we went on the hunt for breakfast in the area. Mike got what ended up being his favorite food of the trip at this point from Isaac Toast, which was like a grilled cheese sandwich with sausage, egg, cabbage, pickle, cheese, and the popular Korean bulgogi sauce (kind of like a bbq soy sauce) all served pipping hot. Our next stop was to Gyeongbokgung Palace, and we arrived just in time for the changing of the guard ceremony.This was our most cultural experience while in Seoul, and you can even rent traditional Hanbok clothes while you're here, we just didn't have the time. This was about the point I realized how difficult the day was going to be because I was so tired. Also, please enjoy all the baby finger hearts I am about to make in every photo always, because this is also very Korean.
After the palace, we walked the streets to our next market location for the lunch, but stopped at a bunch of random small icons along the way like...Walking the Cheonggyecheon Stream...
We ended our walk at the Namdaemun Market, where we thought there would be more food, but it turned out to be a lot of clothing and goods. It was a very overwhelming place with a lot of back alleys and people, and definitely easy to get lost. Lucky for us, we got a little lost in the direction of my favorite snack, the gamja hot dog (a sausage encased in a french fry coating). There were also a few rare cats like the Siamese, Bengal, and genet cat who even sat on our shoulders.The ones I was most excited to meet though were the raccoon and the meerkats. The raccoons name was Pooh and he was the chilliest little thing hangin' out in his house before he put himself to bed for a nap.The meerkats were so cool and curious. The minute you sat down they would dig through all of your pockets and scratch at your phone. They absolutely loved Emily at first and were all trying to sit on her at once. Then they started climbing on Mike's shoulders (which I was super jealous of). My fav little guy kept cuddling up in my lap and falling immediately asleep though, so it was totally worth it.When the sun began to set, we took the cable car up to Seoul Tower Observatory. My favorite snack of the day was the Lorry Cheese filled waffle, and actually might have been my favorite food the entire trip. You also can see quite a lot of the city surrounding you as well!
There was actually another castle outside we are familiar with, the Snow White castle. It had a lot of ...interesting looking mannequins to tell the familiar fairytale story.
For lunch, we had planned to have more Korean style food, however, we stumbled upon some of our American favorites, and had to get those instead. So we had Earl of Sandwich and Auntie Anne's pretzels and I have 0 regrets. While we ate our lunch we could see a glimpse of the Lotte World Parade, which really cool looking! We had to leave early enough to make sure we fit in the other few things we wanted to do before heading back home. One of the main reasons I wanted to go to Korea in the first place (besides the food) was seeing an image of someone at the Starfield Library on Pinterest many years ago, and it absolutely took my breath away. Getting to visit was a really amazing thing to check off my bucket list.