Olympic Park Picnic

The last Friday night I had in Korea we packed up a dinner and went over to Olympic Park to eat there.  We figured that it would give us a chance to be outside and give Alden a chance to play.  The weather ended up actually being really nice, which was lucky because it had been raining earlier that day.  Here are the pictures from our little evening outing.

We went over to the rose garden first because we didn't get a chance to go by there the last time that we were at the park.

They had this cool piece of artwork in the middle of the rose garden.

We had fun looking at all the different flowers that they had.

 This was where we stopped for our dinner.

Alden had fun playing with his bottle cap while we ate dinner and making Drew and I laugh.

 This bird was hopping around nearby and Alden enjoyed watching it, just like he enjoys watching all animals.

They have a nice playground at Olympic Park that we let Alden play on after dinner.  He enjoyed playing on this horse and running around following all the big kids.

We left the playground when Alden started getting tired.  We all had a good time at the park that evening and it was nice to let Alden play somewhere a little different for an evening.

Times Square Mall: Seoul

A little over a week before I left Korea we went over to a mall called Times Square Mall in Seoul, just so that we could have somewhere new to explore.  It was a really fun mall to walk around in.  Drew was really excited to find an arcade that he could go to to play games.  Alden really enjoyed watching all of the people around us.  My favorite thing was walking through the stores and seeing the similarities and differences between everything there and everything back here in the states.  This mall actually had a lot of stores like Express, GAP and Guess that are common in the US.  The only difference was that their merchandise seemed to be more expensive in Korea.  However, I didn't look too closely so that may not always be true.  Anyways, we had a great time exploring and seeing somewhere new.  Here are a few pictures of the mall.

It was a huge mall, and these pictures only show the upper floors, not the basement or attached underground shopping center.

We ate at an AMAZING Japanese curry place for dinner.  WE thought it was really good and Alden had a good time playing with his cup and eating a little bit.

Everland

On my last full Monday in Korea Drew took the day off so that we could go to Everland.  The best way to describe Everland is the Korean version of Disneyland.  We took a public bus out to Everland that morning and it took about an hour.  Once we got to the park and got inside we rented a stroller and then were off to see the rides they had and explore the park.  It took us a little while to figure out how to read the maps they had and know what rides we could take Alden on but once we figured it out it was fairly easy to navigate and figure out where we wanted to go. We had a blast going on all the different rides, walking around, watching the other people in the park and exploring.

 Standing in line to get our tickets

This was Alden and Drew getting on the ride that was their version of "It's a Small World"

 Alden really enjoyed watching everything on this ride and was really good at sitting still.  Here is a video of part of the ride.  

We thought it was a little funny that the representation of the US was some cheerleaders, a football game, the Golden Gate Bridge, the Statue of Liberty and Broadway.

 I took Alden on this ride that just rode around a track in a circle but he ended up really not liking it because of how the people working there made me hold him.

Alden ended up really liking this next ride which was called "Sky Dancing."  Here is a video of us on the ride.

 The next ride was the carousel and Alden just enjoyed watching everyone around us.  Here is a video of us on the carousel.

 Drew enjoyed trying to win a prize in one of the shooting games!

 Alden was getting tired by the time I took him on this ride so he mostly just sat there not reacting.  As you will see in the next picture, he fell asleep very soon afterwards.  Here is a video that Drew took of us on the ride.

 It was really fun having an extra full day with Drew before I had to leave Korea.

This area was fun to walk through.  Everland's "Holland Village"  had lots of restauraunts and live music playing.

I really liked all the neat birds that we got to see.

 Drew had a lot of fun getting to feed this little bird.

After Alden woke up from his nap we took him on a Safari ride that was a huge bus that drove through areas with lions, tigers and bears (Oh my!).  Alden loved it!

 The cutest thing that Alden did all day at the park was when he saw this tiger (shown above)  he pointed at it, turned to Drew and signed "Please."  He didn't want to say good-bye to that tiger.

 These are more animals we saw on the ride.

 The bus we rode on was even designed to look like a tiger.

 Alden went with Daddy while he fed some guinea pigs.  

Alden liked watching of all the guinea pigs.

Alden watching a cute baby cub.

I thought this owl was really pretty.

Alden thought these were the scariest thing that he saw all day.  He did not like how much they moved around and they scared him when they jumped up to the window in front of him.

 Alden liked these ones more because they did not move much.

Drew and Alden at dinner time.  Alden was having a lot of fun eating his food and talking.

 Okay, this was probably one of the funniest things that we saw al day.  In the summer time they put on a huge water show a couple times a day.  We went over to watch from a little ways away and just as we did the wind changed and the entire crowd in front of us got soaked and they all started running backwards.  It was entertaining to watch.  We just got a little mist on us, which we didn't care about.  The other funny thing was that there were workers holdings signs up (you can see them in the pictures above) that said "You may get wet in this area"  but apparently nobody paid attention to the signs.  Here is a little video of it, I find the screams in the video funny.  It is just water.

 We had to wait for the water show to clear out to get back to where we wanted to go so we let Alden ride this little car.

 We took him on the carousel one last time.

 We went and walked through this garden area as we finished up our day.

 After a long day for our little boy he was tired and just wanted to rest in the stroller and hold the little tiger that we got him because he couldn't have the real one.

We had a great day at Everland and we hope you enjoy seeing all of our pictures!