The Dragon Hill Lodge

On our first trip to Seoul, I shunned the Dragon Hill lodge because our previous army accommodations were less than stellar (I don't want to mention the name for fear that the Worlds Nicest Lady, the manager of said lodge, will find out). Today, we entered what appears to be a four star resort and I realized my mistake. Wow. I know that Dragon Hill is an R&R location—one of eight in the world, incidentally—but I had no idea it was a resort in the middle of Seoul. Our mistake. It's also dreadfully affordable.

Yongsan Garrison is an odd one. It's huge, an entire burg in the middle of Seoul. It spans over a mile in every direction. There are a lot of suburbs, which is military housing. It must be a little surreal to live in a suburb in the middle of a huge city. I didn't take any pictures to go with this post. The Army is pretty serious about security, and this lies in one of those gray areas where it seems reasonable, but I don't want to get in trouble. This ginormous garrison, for example, will not turn up on any map of Seoul you find. I imagine the confusion of tourists who encounter this THING surrounded by barbed wire and peer at their maps, wondering if they've lost their minds. We had some confusion when we first got to Daegu because of this same problem. Silly, really. I imagine all residents of Seoul know where Yongsan Garrison is. There's no reason to protect the location like its classified.

Anyways, Dragon Hill is a city within a city. There are several restaurants, and when Bobby saw pictures of the Sunday brunch spread, he was sorry we're only staying one night. The PX is open 24 hours (ours is only open 11-7). It will be a complete pain to have to get off this huge Garrison to get around Seoul, but I think we'll stomach it next time we want to come to Seoul and stay at Dragon Hill anyways.

We encountered someone on the tour who has lived in Korea for three years and is envious of my access to Army bases and American food. I think if I lived in Seoul, where there's a huge expat community, I would be cool like the high schooler with a fake ID. Our friend said he missed pizza, which you can only get from little America. Pi-ja, as you may have noticed from a flier I posted earlier, is a far cry from what we are used to. Bobby ordered one last week that actually had curry as a sauce. I thought that was cool, but he was less than impressed.