Travel expenses to South-Korea

Hi everyone I'm finally back~

I got my laptop back a few days before my guarantee was up and guess what, this laptop started exact same thing which for I brought it to maintenance only one day after my guarantee was up.. dunno if they did that on purpose so I would buy their newest model or whatsoever. Next time I'm not gonna buy Acer laptop. I won't be bringing this to maintenance anymore because now it costs alot so when my laptop is in a state I cannot use it anymore I just buy a new one. I'm sick of going back and forth in maintenance... like with my last laptop. This is only one year old but started faults less than half year when I bought it... ggaaaahhh..

But anyway let's go to this post's topic which is

Travel costs and things you need to consider when travelling to South-Korea.

 These are my personal experiences and 3 out of 4 times I stayed 2 weeks so my calculations are based on that. And also because everyone usually stays only in Seoul I'm talking about travel expenses in that point of view. And I live in Finland so my calculations of travel expenses are most useful to those who live in northern europe.

Travel expenses

I live in Finland near Helsinki airport so I always leave from there. I got most of my flights as promotion tickets and I always had Finnair's direct flights. As I have mentioned earlier I have pretty serious motion sickness so I don't want to take connecting flights because it would make me feel sick two or three days (even though it would be most likely cheaper). But I have to say when Finnair is holding promotions you'll get flights to Seoul in pretty affordable prices. Cheapest roundtrip I have gotten was 459€ and the most expensive was 895€. It really depends when you're reserving and also if it's off season or not. But I would advice to reserve approximately 800€ for flights. Finnair has had promotions pretty often so *wink wink* if you're eyeing fligths to Korea from Finland (I feel like they have discounts every 2-months). And I advice you to join Finnair plus especially if you're finnish person, you will get news as soon as they have campaigns.


I have not stayed in hotels in Korea because guest houses and hostels are basically in level of average european hotel. To finnish person hostel or guest house might at first sound cheap accommodation with messy rooms but in Korea 7 out of 8 guest houses I have stayed in have been very clean and cozy, almost hotel like. So I always go with guest house option rather than spending my money on expensive stay in hotel. Cheapest price I paid for two weeks in guest house was 130€ and most expensive was about 290€. So if you would like to save money but still get comfortable accommodation I recommend guest houses. I would advice to save about 300€ for 2 weeks stay in guest house.

When you're in Seoul you will need travel card for subway because believe me, you will use subway alot. It's convenient and easy way to travel inside the city. I have to admit I rarely use buses because a) subways go almost everywhere in Seoul and b) because it's sometimes difficult to know where you are supposed to get off.
Most easiest travel card is T-Money which you can purchase from convenience stores for example. If I remember correct the card itself is 5000won (approximately 4€) and you can load it in machines that are usually near gates in subway stations. You can also return your card to those machines when you don't need it anymore and get a refund. I don't remember how much is the refund because I have been keeping my T-money card because I travel to Korea often.
I recommend you save 30€ (approximately 37000won)  for T-money for 2 weeks.

Food is really cheap in Korea. You can get a meal with couple euros in korean restaurants. For example kimbap is usually 3000won (2€), kimchijjigae 5000won (4€) and tonkasu 6000won (4,50€). More expensive is to eat something like samgyeopsal which is meant to be eaten with at least 2 persons and it costs about 11000won (9€) per person. So I'd say you'll only need a little over 120€ for 2 weeks for food.

I'll put this in here even though I said I will mainly talk about Seoul travel point of view; some people want to visit second largest city Busan while in Korea. I advice you to take KTX to save time. Even if it's a bit more expensive (something like 47000won for foreigners). But it's a bullet train and it takes you to Busan in 3 hours instead of 5½ hours. KTX leaves from Seoul station so it's right in center of Seoul.

Other things to consider

I advice to take big luggage. Especially for western people clothes and cosmetics are very cheap not to mention good quality so most people will end up buying alot. I mainly bought cosmetics because compared to Finland it was cosmetics heaven with really affordable prices :P

If you're average size in european sizes (M or L) you will most likely not find pants so if you like wearing pants like me for example, pack more than one pair. (with pants I mean mainly jeans etc). If you're bigger size in shoes than eu 38, it will be difficult to find any shoes also. You will find sneakers but that's mainly it so if you like wearing f.e ballerinas then take your own with you. Korea uses different size chart than europe, I'm eu size 41 and my size in Korean shoes is 260.

Check if your vaccinations are effective. You will need hepatitis vaccination for travelling in Seoul but if you're planning to go outside Seoul it is adviced to take vaccination for japanese encephalitis (this costs about 100€ so it's very expensive but the most important thing is health right).

I advice to take mosquito repellant with you, about half of guest houses I have stayed have had mosquitos. They are alive even in winter (really how?!)... so if you want to sleep comfortably then seriously take repellant with you.

 Learn couple words in korean. You will get treated more kindly even if you can only say "hello" in korean. But it would be good to know basic korean when you're going because even in Seoul people mostly don't speak english.

Because you are foreigner, people will stare. More than in most countries. Some even want to take photos with you if you're blond westerner (more if your eyes are light color). This is just normal behaviour for koreans as they consider everything light colored very beautiful. If you have pale skin people will most likely comment on this and call you pretty. Some might want to touch you to test if your skincolor is "real" but this you can decline though most people just touch you without permission. It's not rude to say "please don't touch me" because they are invading your personal space in their curiousity.

Beware of scooters. Seriously, they do not care if you are in the way... they're crazy. Even if it's small street they will just increase speed so as much as possible walk on side of road, not right in the middle.

This is just my personal tip but visit Myeongdong at least once in the evening. It's crowded but they have unique korean street food stalls in there. You can get ddeokbokki, hotteok, jjimbang, mandu and many more. They usually also have some things that is hard to find elsewhere.

Cost together

So how much you should save money for 2 weeks trip? If you're on low budget like me usually, you have to have at least 1300€ for flights, accommodation and food. If you have to take vaccinations, add 100€ more to cost (I took my vaccinations when I visited there first time).

So that's only cost of basic things. You will need more money saved if you want to do some shopping. Conclusion is... yes, from western countries it is pricey to go to Korea but it's amazing country with lot to offer so I recommend the experience. Look at me, I have visited there 4 times and I still have many things left to see and experience :P I hope I can go to Korea again early next year.

If you have something you want to ask me about travelling to Korea, leave comment below :)

Korea trip diaries: Day 13 to 17

Day 13

Ilsan & Itaewon

On thursday I left to Ilsan to meet my friend Hyojoo. She lives there and I love Ilsan area :) It takes about an hour to go there from Seoul city center.

You can access to Ilsan with line 3 (orange line) to Daehwa's direction and getting off at Jeongbalsan. And if I don't remember wrong, exit 1 and 3 will go straight to Ilsan's center direction (actually you're pretty much in the center when you come out of subway).
Using this station you can also access to Mbc's building which is close to subway station and there are recordings of music core for example.

I met Hyojoo at subway station 1pm. We went to post office first because I had a card I wanted to send to Finland :P Oh, about post in Korea; if you're planning on sending cards, best place to buy them are museums or then Insadong. Elsewhere is pretty hard to find any cards to send for your relatives and friends. And post boxes are reeeeally hard to find so I recommend you go directly to post office. They mostly don't speak english in post offices but it's enough when you give your card and say destination, they understand that at least. But because they don't understand english mostly, they always put the more expensive class (1st class) but it's still cheap for you if you're from western countries.

Then we headed to eat and OMG Hyojoo brought us to japanese restaurant where meals were absolutely delicious and art to the eye :D It was in Ilsan's mall, 2nd floor.

Then after we finished eating we visited Aritaum cosmetic shop and I bought myself a cushion blusher finally. I was debating if I should get it or not because it was on pricey side but Iope was highly recommended by countless bloggers so I decided to get it. Besides it was cheaper in Korea than if I would have bought it from online.

After shopping some cosmetics we bought coffee and started walking towards Ilsan lake park which is popular place to exercise and just hang out.

We stopped to one bench, drank our coffee and just talked. At one moment we were interrupted by mbc staff asking if they could interview us but we declined because we are not that good in front of camera. But it was funny how they came to us behind us and then looked at me and yelled "omg foreigner" xD they didn't expect that because at that time we were speaking in korean lol.

But I had nice day and view was sooo beautiful. It was sooo sunny at that day so excuse my photos that are looking a bit blurry.

After walking back to subway station and said goodbyes, I hopped to subway and went to Itaewon where I met Anniina and her friend at subway station. We had plans to go to eat and I was waiting like real korean meal and stuff because it was my last evening in Seoul. Anniina forgot to tell me that her friend wanted to eat vegetarian meal and they had looked up one specific restaurant to get from Itaewon. So I was clearly pissed off and they could see it... afterwards I was a bit sorry but when I get annoyed I can't hide it well. After Anniina and her friend ordered their meal, we went to nearest Taco Bell and I ordered my food from there lol. We all ate in there.

When we were talking suddenly at our side one girl came to us and was in finnish like "anteeks mut mä kuulin et puhuitte suomea niin oli pakko tulla juttelee" which is basically that she was saying she heard us speaking finnish and that's why she came to talk to us xD Then we just talked with her for awhile. She hadn't met finnish people in Korea except one from her university so she was a bit amazed.

After finishing our meals, we went to desserts in Baskin & Robbins (of course hehe). Then it started to get late and we headed up to Hyehwa.

Day 14 to 17

Because I was from friday to monday in my ex's house I won't tell about this part. But basically on friday morning I left to Buyeo and Anniina came to say goodbye at the morning.

I left Korea monday morning. First I had to hop on to airport bus from Gongju at 5am. I was at airport 7.10am, I had to search my check-in desk while trying to drag my heavy luggage lol. I bumped to people couple times ^^;;;

Check-in opened 7.30am so it was ideal. But I had to pay 75€ for overweight. I knew it was overweight and at least about a year ago Finnair offered advance payment which was 50€ but now they have removed that... those greedy...

Anyway, I was in trouble because my luggage was actually too heavy so I had to move couple stuff to my backpack. Lucky I had left my backpack half empty so they fit there easy. I felt like it was more strict in security check because one employee came to me like "backpack can only be 8kg" and I was like yeah? It is... Because I knew mine was under. She was really arrogant and lifted my backpack but I was amused when I saw her face go "oh" and then she was like ok and left. I almost said "I told you so."

Security queue went kinda fast but passport check took time. And queue was reeeeeally long. But after half an hour I finally got through. Then I straight up headed to other side. In Incheon, they have two terminal sides and one is where you have to use this kind of mini train to get there. And you can't come back to other side anymore. It's kinda like in Helsinki-Vantaa has schengen and non-schengen sides in terminal 2.

Anyway, I arrived to that side and my gate was close to shops this time (usually gates to Helsinki end up being really far back). I shopped last souvenirs and then it was already time for boarding. Everything went smoothly and we got to leave on time.

My flight was a little late in Helsinki's side but not much, like 20 minutes only.

I have to say I experienced many new things on this trip even though it was my 4th time in Korea. There's still much to experience. I'm already planning to go to Korea again in next spring. Maybe March? I can't get enough of Korea :P


---------------------------

My next update is coming maybe in 2 weeks? I have to bring my laptop to maintenance and as I have said before, I have tablet but it sucks. So I'm basically without internet at least a week. I don't know how long it will take to repair my laptop, it might be longer than 2 weeks. But I will be back as soon as I get my laptop back~