Tips for FIRST TIME Visitors in Seoul, South Korea (2024) 🇰🇷 #koreatravel #koreatraveltips

Seoul is the vibrant capital of South Korea which   you most probably would have already  heard of thanks to the rise of K-pop! K-pop aside though it is widely considered to  be one of the most livable cities in Asia and   as someone who's only recently returned  from Soul I can easily attest to this! I mean what's not to love? This urban city is full of amazing  places to see, delicious food to eat,   and some of the friendliest slash most  attractive people I have ever met! It is no wonder that Seoul, South Korea remains  one of the top tourist destinations in Asia! In fact that's most probably why  you've clicked on this video! So whether you're planning a trip to South Korea  for the first time or perhaps even relocating to   Seoul South Korea this is the video for you as  I'm going to be sharing things that I learned   while researching before going and also things  that I learned during my trip there for 2 weeks I'm going to be dividing this video into two main  sections in the first section we're going to be   talking about things that I would recommend  you know before going on your trip which will   include things that I recommend you pack for  your trip to South Korea in the second section   we're going to be talking about things that you  should know when you're in South Korea which will   cover things such as how to navigate yourself in  the city as well as overcoming language barriers Basically by the end of this video you're  going to be navigating yourself through   Soul South Korea like a seasoned traveler  and not make all the mistakes step I made There are chapters in this video so whilst  I think you should know every single thing   that I mention in this video do feel  free to click ahead to the chapters   that are of more interest to you you can  always come back to the other ones later and so if that sounds like something  you'd be into well then click on the   Subscribe Button as I will be uploading more  Korea content in the coming weeks and also   strap yourselves in for my ultimate  South Korea travel guide, let's go! Let's start with the best  time to visit South Korea I mean if you ask me I'm going to say anytime is  a good time to visit South Korea but if you're not   a fan of Colder temperatures for example you  might be interested to know that South Korea   goes through Four Seasons a year in particular the  warmer seasons are spring from April to June and   summer and July to August and so April to June  AKA spring is widely considered to be the best   time to visit especially if you want to check  out the cherry blossoms although if you came   in summer you could be part of the beach crew at  Haeundae Beach or check out coastal cities which   tend to be a bit cooler like Busan you could also  choose to visit in the second most popular season   which is Autumn that happens between September  to November where the city turns into a beautiful   Hue of orange and yellow and when many festivals  happen but if budget is bit more of a concern you   may want to consider to visit in Winter which  happens between December to March specifically   according to my research January seems to be the  time when flight tickets are at its cheapest in   fact I personally chose to go in Winter because I  really wanted to see their Christmas decorations fair warning it does get really cold so  if you plan to visit in Winter suit up and   be ready for the temperatures to dip into  the double digit negatives degrees celcius I honestly was not expecting this next one  but I'm glad I was prepared anyway and that   is to bring a comfortable pair of walking  shoes because whether you're heading to the   next destination on your itinerary, wandering  around in the markets or even in between lines   at a train station you are going to be walking  like I was averaging a 20,000 steps a day easy! so yeah definitely make  sure you pack this with you Whilst South Korea is predominantly a cashless  Society I do recommend for you to have a little   bit of Korean WON on hand especially if you  plan to visit Food Markets or places that are   a bit further away from the city if you don't  like the idea of bringing so much cash around   I would also recommend getting a WOW pass which  is something we will get into later in this video This next one's not really South Korea  specific but it's just something that I   found uh that I found to be helpful as someone who   travels quite frequently and that  is to be ready with power Banks I mean if you're going to be outdoor for  the whole day exploring the city this is   something that you definitely want to bring with  you I personally am a fan of this 4-in-1 charger   it allows me to charge multiple devices at one  go and also typically gives me at least two to   three charges on my phone when it's fully charged  but if you're like me and I'm always capturing   content on the go I would also recommend one  of these Snap-on battery packs that allows your   phone to charge while you're using it to capture  content there is also absolutely no obligation   but if you do feel like purchasing one of these  gadgets click on the snap wireless link on my   profile and purchase it via that link where I  will earn a tiny bit of commission from your   purchase that will honestly just go towards  me creating more content like this for you I also have highly recommend for you to check  in one of these collapsible bags to give you   that extra bit of luggage space it's going to come  real handy when you plan to do a bit of shopping the way it works is you simply unzip it  and voila! you've got yourself a extra   bag to make space for all your extra shopping This next one is something that is  honestly the first thing I look into   when I'm traveling to a new country  and that is mobile data connection There are a few ways you can do this buy a  local SIM, turn on your data roaming or my   personal preference which is to use the ESim  slot in my phone for those who don't know eSIM   is a virtual SIM card slot that allows your  phone to take on an extra data Network whilst   keeping your original physical SIM card in  the phone to keep receiving SMS and calls   most phones come with an eSim slot nowadays  to find out if your phone is eSim compatible   you simply need to see if your phone has  an EID which you will generally find under   your phone settings I am a power user of Airalo  which is an eSim provider all you need to do is   to sign up and log into the app like so select  your country of destination which in this case   is South Korea and you will see the data plans  that are available in this case both the data   plans are unlimited you just have to choose  between between the 10 or 30 days select the   plan that you're after make a payment and  they actually make it so convenient now you   simply click this button right here and it  installs the Esim ready to go on your phone As a regular user of Airalo I can actually  give you $3 off your first purchase simply   enter code Steve5974 when making your  first purchase and thank me later okay you've now arrived at ancient  airport and need to get to your   accommodation there are several ways for  you to get from the airport to the city PS if you haven't exchanged any money yet  you can actually do this at the arrivals  the cheapest way to get to the city would be  via the AREX Express train which would take   roughly 50 minutes from the International  Airport Terminal 1 to Seoul station this   option will cost you around 9,500 Korean  W or around $7 us if you are carrying a   few luggage bags or perhaps traveling with  friends or family catching a cab might be   a better option I did this option myself as I  was carrying two luggage bags it cost me about   56,800 Korean one to get from the terminal  to Gangam which works up to be around $44 I booked my cab via an app called Kakao  Taxi which I would recommend for you to   get if you plan to catch a cab at any  point when you're traveling in South   Korea and in this next section I'm also  going to cover some of the other apps   that I would recommend for you to download  onto your phone when you're in South Korea So Grab doesn't exist in South Korea Uber does  under the name Uber Taxi however in my 2 weeks of   living in South Korea I found the user experience  for Kakao Taxi to be superior that said I've also   had people report good user experiences with  Uber taxi and as such I would recommend for   you to have both apps on your phone as a backup  since hailing a cab during pick hours can be   challenging and also for you to compare prices  the app itself is super user friendly - simply   load up your credit card details and yes foreign  credit cards are accepted nowadays and you're good   to go there are a few categories that to book  from as you can see however to make it simple   General would do in most cases especially if  you're not traveling too far and blue is the   one that I used during peak hours when the general  cabs were harder to ha feel free to also ask me   any questions that you might have relating to  Kakao taxi or Uber taxi in the comment section Speaking of navigating yourself through Seoul  Google Maps doesn't work as well in South Korea   at least in my experience I have had some  people tell me that they've had fantastic   user experiences with Google Maps and so  however in my personal experience I just   found the app to lag and also the directions  it would give me would just not be as accurate   when compared against local map apps such as  Kakao and Naver maps my personal preference   would be for Naver Maps I just found the  user experience to be a lot more intuitive   I also wanted to take this opportunity to share  with you some of the hot tips that I personally   found useful while using Naver Maps one of  the things that I particularly enjoyed about   Naver is when I enter the name of somewhere I  wanted to go in English it would most of the   time pick up where I wanted to go in Korean  when it didn't though this is what I did I went to Google Maps and I searched for  the place I wanted to go scroll down and   you will see the address in Korean copy and  paste that into Naver like so and VOILA! As I also don't read Korean I used two ways  to verify that the address that I had entered   was correct the first way to do it would be  to look at the numbers as you can see from   these two addresses here if the numbers such  as the street number and building number are   the same there's a very good chance that you  have entered in the correct address the other   way I did this was to Simply scroll down this  Naver map at the point of destination and look   at the pictures if the pictures resemble where  you want to go there's also a very good chance   that you're headed in the right direction!  like when I searched for Cafe onion there   were three different Cafe onions but there  was one in particular that I wanted to go to   so when I did copy and paste that address  in I checked the pictures and they looked   exactly like the ones I saw on Instagram so I  knew that I was headed in the right direction Also another hot tip - please make sure  the train that your catching is headed in   the right direction to verify that it's going  in the direction of your travel look at where   it's bound for on the map here and cross  check that with the Train sign here or here If you're like me and do not speak Korean  you're going to want to download this next   app it's called Papago and it's going to be  the absolute godsent when you're in Korea As I was mostly in Seoul I really only  used this app when I was navigating   the food markets and speaking to the  ajummas however you're probably going   to be using this app a lot more if you're  venturing for further away from the city To communicate to someone else in Korean simply   type in what you want to say  in the app like so and VOILA! aside from conversations I also found  this app to be superbly helpful when I   was at restaurants or bars where the  menu was completely in Korean all I   had to do was to point the phone camera  to the menu like so and take a picture   and it automatically translates  it to English as you can see here But if you're on the hunt for K beauty  products like almost everybody else that   goes to Korea and are perhaps a little  bit overwhelmed by the sheer amount of   products that are available out there this  app's for you because it actually shows you   the top rated skincare products that Koreans  actually use it's called Hwahae and yes it's   all in Korean but you can easily translate  this using papago or even Google translate The app is loaded with functions but as  a beginner all you really need to know   is to click on the second menu item  which roughly translates to rankings,   the default view here will show you the top  rated skincare products as rated by actual   users of the product across all categories  but let's say if I'm looking for something   specific like sunscreen well then all I need  to do is to click on the drop- down filter on   the left and select suncare and VOILA here are  the top three screen products in Korea currently click on any of the products for  a full ingredient list breakdown,   active ingredients used, pricing  and actual customer reviews honestly this app saved me so much time  at olive and young because I walked in   knowing exactly what I was going to get  if you didn't know this you're welcome! Speaking of Essentials in Korea I strongly  recommend for you to get a WOW pass it is   an all-in-one prepaid card specifically  designed for foreign Travelers with a   triple function of allowing you to exchange your  money from 16 different countries to Korean WON,   use as a debit card for cashless payments  which I personally found to be quite helpful   as Apple pay didn't always work you can  also use this for all forms of public   transportation you will need to scan your  passport in order to purchase the card and   the purchase process is very straightforward  there is a deposit fee of 5,000 Korean WON   but you can actually get this back at the  end of your trip or if you intend to return   to Korea again like I do you can actually  just keep this card for your return visit This is just a quick summary of  The WOW pass so do also feel free   to ask me any questions that you  might have in the comment section Speaking of taking the subway though  here are some general Subway etiquette   that you may want to be aware of ONE, always  stand out of the way of exiting passengers, TWO, and everybody I saw strictly abided by this  was to not sit in the red priority seats which   are reserved for people with disabilities pregnant  and senior citizens I mean no one's going to stop   you from sitting sitting on the seats per se but  you will be met with many stairs of disapproval thirdly try to be quiet and refrain from eating or   taking calls inside the train this is  another etiquette that they really do   abide by strictly so I strongly suggest  that you do the same to be respectful All right you've got yourself  to South Korea what now? if you're like me you're most probably  looking for places to eat well if you're   already a subscriber you may have already  noticed me uploading some YouTube shorts   on places I'd recommend you check out in  South Korea if you haven't that's okay if   you're not a subscriber that's okay too  because I don't gatekeep I will link my   Korea playlist at the end of this video so  that you can go ahead and check that out next I also upload food and travel content on  a regular basis so do feel free to hit   that subscribe button and join the PHAT  team as we check out PHAT things to see,   eat and do in cities across the  world or one city at a time! and if you got to this point of the video I  want to thank you so much for your support it   really does mean everything as always  I hope that you have a fantastic day   ahead or that youve already had a good day  I will see you very soon in the next video!

Channel: PhatLife Project

Views: 34,668

Keywords: tips first time visitors korea, tips for visiting korea, tips for visiting seoul, tips when going to korea, tips when traveling to korea, south korea, south korea travel guide, south korea travel, seoul south korea, seoul korea, seoul, korea, south korea vlog, korea vlog, going to korea for the first time, seoul travel, visiting south korea for the first time, life in korea, seoul travel guide, living in south korea, seoul south korea travel guide, seoul korea travel tips

Id: O_uMjpZ7U1U

Length: 16min 14sec (974 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 06 2024