Incheon

For the first two nights of our trip we were staying in the Hamilton Hotel smack-bang in the centre of Incheon, where the Westerners tend to hang out. I use the term "smack-bang" because if you wanted smack it wouldn't be too hard to find a dealer and if it was a bang you were after the city's red light district was 50-metres up the road.

Here's a view from the hotel window, overlooking the main junction with plenty of Western-chain restaurants. Those less adventurous in the club wouldn't have too far for dinner here. The hotel had laid on a really nice Korean meal for us, where I got to try Kim Chee (spicy pickled cabbage of some sort) for the first time. Very nice too!

Kim Chee in the 80s courtesy of the WWF

Kim Chee today

"Shut your mouth and look at my wad" said Harry Enfield in the early-90s. Well here's my wad of Korean Won; one million's worth. I had brought around £550 worth of currency to spend in South Korea, which the bank had nicely gift wrapped for me. I had planned on just bringing £500 but when I saw that I was not far off being a millionaire I had to go for it. As it turns out I could easily have survived with a fifth of that amount. The currency rates on this occasion had been extremely favourable.
Here's another view from the hotel window. This time overlooking a very busy pool-party on the roof of our hotel. It wasn't particularly hot, but it was humid. I think the crowd were making the most of what I discovered later to be the last pool-party of the season (this was September).

Following check-in and before the meal a few of us decided to go out for a small walk to a nearby bridge. The Banpo bridge is just a bridge that goes over the river but last year the city authorities decided to turn it into one of the world's largest fountain displays, with fountains firing out horizontally along its length. It was just a mile away from the hotel so we thought we could easily do this.

This is what the display looks like.

A wonderfully simple mural.

I would come to realise later just how physically fit the Korean people are. This multi-gym set up in a small park was a hint. I have only ever seen this in one place in the UK I guess because in most locations it would get trashed.

So in researching the Banpo bridge I'd written to the company that had installed the fountains and asked them what time the display would be at, 2000 supposedly. Here's David stepping out over the side of the bridge in preparation for the display starting. We waited and waited and waited and well nothing happened. No display tonight. We jokingly suggested we may had got the wrong bridge and would see it going off up the river, but that was not the case. It turns out that the display was at 1900 and 2100, having been changed a few weeks prior. So did we come back an hour later? Nope, we'd written the night off as a dismal Malcolm-failure and were back at the hotel enjoying the meal.

The sign isn't saying "Danger - beware of ill prepared tourists walking on this bridge"

At night Incheon comes alive. Close-by is an American military base and this is where the soldiers come to "let loose". Because of this the area has a bit of a bad reputation.

Having said that they do tolerate Ginger folk.

and they don't hold back on their advertising.

Having explored a little of the Incheon area it was time to succumb to the long flight and rest up for the next day, which would take in two parks and a rather fun morning side-trip.