I love the fact that airfares to Asia from the West Coast of the United States are so cheap at the moment. I am not sure what they will be in the future, but as of Fall 2019 when I am writing this, it is an amazing time to go and explore all that Asia has to offer. I had a trip that I needed to take to Cambodia and the Philippines, and I was working my airfare shopping magic with the Momondo app when I came across a fare with Delta and Korean Airlines that was only $700 for a multi-stop itinerary. I know I could have gotten a fare for about $100 less, but I’m a Delta/Skyteam guy and with my Platinum status on Delta the benefits add up with international travel. The itinerary also gave me a 10 hour layover in Seoul, which I personally was excited about (I know…I’m weird). My buddy Daniel clued next into the fact that the Seoul airport offers free layover tours that vary from 1 hour in length to over 5 hours long. These tours range from seeing historical sites to shopping, and even a foodie tour of local eateries. If you are looking for a reason to get a glimpse of Korea, these layover tours will do the trick nicely. Here’s a couple of things to keep in mind. First, depending on when your flight arrives, you may want to have a plan to go rest in the lounge a couple of hours. The first tours start at 8:00am and if you have a flight like mine that gets in at 4:30am, it will be nice to go rest and relax in a lounge for a couple of hours. The second thing to keep in mind is to notice where the Layover Tour info desks are in your terminal. I noticed in Terminal 2 that there was a desk right at the top of the escalators after clearing the security checkpoint for connections. The desk didn’t open til 7:00am so I knew I had plenty of time to go relax and then come back at 7:30am to check in for my tour. The third thing to keep in mind is that you can book your tour ahead of time to guarantee a spot at your desired time. They have half the spots on a tour available the day of so don’t worry if you decide not to book in advance. I chose to book mine ahead of time because I needed to make sure that I had enough time to get back to the airport and clear immigration and security. The fourth thing to remember is that you will have to go through immigration to go on the tour. There is a representative that will guide you through the process, but it doesn’t hurt to have your immigration forms already filled out. I grabbed my immigrations forms on the flight into Seoul so I was ready to rock and roll once it was time to go and connect with the tour. One final thing to note is that even though the tour is free, there may be a small charge that you will need to pay for admission to historical sites if you choose a tour other than shopping. I am sure that it is obvious there will be some expense if you do a food tour, but the temple tour I went on had a $4 USD charge for park admissions. Good to be aware of ahead of time. They do accept credit card for the payment so don’t worry if you don’t have cash. The best part of my experience with the Seoul Layover Tour was the fact that they truly made it effortless. The information areas are well marked, and having a person that walked you from the connections area in the terminal back through security and immigration added a layer of comfort to the process, especially if you are newer to international travel. All in all, the Seoul Layover Tour is an amazing way to get a taste of Korea in a short amount of time. I got to meet some amazing people as well from other countries and that was an added bonus. So if you have the chance to go through Seoul and you end up with a long layover, take the leap and grab a seat on one of their Layover Tours!