A morning in Seoul

More back blips as I catch up.

I had a morning in Seoul (arriving 4 a.m.)  on my way back from  Ulaanbaatar to Moscow.  It was a roundabout route but compelled to do so by ticket availability.  I took a bus from the airport to downtown Seoul (the driver bowed to the passengers before we left).  Most of the city was still sleeping so I walked around the empty streets for a couple of hours.  It was a foggy morning and consequently visibility was poor (for photography).  I think it was fog though there were lots of policemen about wearing face masks.  This is Gyeongbokgung Palace, built in 1395 during the Joseon dynasty. Burnt down in the 1590s during the Japanese invasions, it was abandoned for 250 years, then restored, only to be destroyed again when Imperial Japan annexed Korea in 1910.

The extra blip is a view of downtown Seoul.  This was my first visit to South Korea and albeit a fleeting one it was interesting to see the contrast to North Korea.