We traveled by subway to a section of Seoul called Myeongdong, which is a huge touristy and foreign area. It's full of shopping and food. Apparently most of the area here is owned by Chinese business owners. I'm not sure about this as a fact but that's what someone told me. We had lunch and one of our group needed to go shopping at the H&M, so we wandered around Myeongdong for a while.
From Myeongdong station you can walk through to Namsan which is probably the closest you can get to the opposite of Myeongdong. It's an old looking residential area that is just as full of restaurants and shops but with guest houses instead of apartments and hotels in skyscrapers on top of all the buildings. Its built right up the lowest part of the large hill/small mountain that the Tower is built on.
You can walk all the way to the base of the tower on a path but it will be a bit of a hike, especially if you are pressed for time. The alternative is buying a ticket to a cable car that takes you directly up to the base of the tower. We chose this option as we weren't looking to stay in Seoul for quite as long as would be required to hike the whole thing. At the base you get to walk up a bit of the old Seoul wall built in the 1300s during the Joseon Dynasty.
Now the theme of the Seoul Tower is Love. Mostly in terms of couples but also friendship and family, etc. I'm not sure if it has always been like this but I have heard that the popularity of the tower increased a lot several years ago when a very popular (popular for no reason I can discern) kdrama included the Namsan Tower for part of the main couple's dramatic love story. I'm not sure if this location was chosen because of the love theme of the tower (and gift shop) or if the theme blossomed because of that drama's popularity. Whatever the reason, love is definitely the theme. There are lock trees, bridges, and fences. You can buy locks to inscribe and lock up. A popular thing seems to be to lock a phone case to the fixture with something written on it - I'm guessing vows of undying love?
The foliage was groomed into heart shapes, and there was a Haechi (possibly officially pronounced Hay-Tay???). People's writing was everywhere. As we discovered on the way down there was also a Cold Stone, however their ice cream was pre-made rather than mushed just for you, so not a real Cold Stone.
To get to the observatory, you have to first get two group photos taken, the first is just your group and the second is you holding the letters L, O, V, and E. It is in front of a green screen so the night landscape seen from the top of the tower can be put behind you. Then you take an elevator to the top. The way up is 30 seconds, and the way down is 25 seconds. The elevator chaperone? chauffeur? whatever they are make sure everyone looks up to the ceiling to see the video of the elevator taking off from the Seoul Tower and blasting off into outerspace. The return trip down is the return trip back to Earth that results in a crash landing into the Tower. The whole thing reminds me of some kind of disney ride.
At the top of the elevator ride is the three levels of observatory. The elevator takes you to the top floor. Each window has the distances from the tower to other big cities around the world. There are those coin operated viewers and of course... a gift shop. There were all sorts of trinkets but one nice thing was that there were also cards, postcards, and postage available to buy. If you brought the addresses with you, you could also mail the postcards (send your love to people all over the world!) with a little post box to drop them in. As I had promised postcards to several people I took that opportunity to buy some.
When you are done on the top floor, down a flight of steps is another floor with lock displays inside some of the windows. Some other parts of the windows show where ancient parts of the wall were complete with palace position and other fun details. This floor also had the most unique bathrooms I have ever been in. There were stalls of course but in front of the stalls were single freestanding basins for hand washing (with mirrors of course). In front of the washing stations were walls that were full sized windows just like the rest of the observatory. I assume at that height it doesn't really matter and it's not like the stalls are open to the windows either. Maybe it's just odd realizing it doesn't matter.
The third floor down is a restaurant. I think it was for booking for private functions and most likely really expensive. We didn't go down to look around, because important looking businessmen were walking up and down the stairs with purpose and 'no fun allowed' looks on their faces.
You take the elevator down when you are done ogling the countryside mountains and crowded metropolis through the smog, and you can hang out again. There was definitely a path open where you could walk down the wall to the gates, which would be cool. I'd like to try that sometime, as well as hiking up and down rather than the cable car. I'd like to plan my hike so that I could go up in the evening and see the view in the dark. I feel like it would look even more spectacular.
During the walk back to Myeongdong station we found a Quiznos, which made the day of one of my friends. He had half decided to quit his job so that he could move there and live in the apartments above the Quiznos.
****Since the time I wrote this originally, I have been back to Namsan for a running meetup. It is a tricky 5.25 mile run around the mountain when you get lost. It is absolutely gorgeous but it can be very stuffy on the mountain trail.
Also we walked by Dongguk University. The main entrance has a park that is absolutely gorgeous.
