Cafe London

I suppose this is a little bit of a special post. Cafe London is located in Gyeonggi-do and not in Seoul but I thought this cafe deserves a mention on this blog. I originally found out about Cafe London through their facebook page. I became a fan of their page and was sent event invitations and reminders as a result of that. I had been meaning to check this cafe out long before now but the fact that it was in Gyeonggi-do put me off a little bit. In my mind I thought it would be really far away and a pain to get to but the reality was not that bad. It took just over an 1 hour from Express Bus Terminal station. Funnily enough what gave me the motivation to go to this cafe was the royal wedding. The strange thing is I have never been a massive fan of the royal family but for some bizarre reason being in Korea has made me what to assert my English-ness (occasionally) so with the help of a Korean friend we made the trip to Cafe London.

Cafe London is a small cafe and when we arrived there were people spilling onto the street. I'm not sure if it's normally like this or because they were hosting the royal wedding event. Luckily, people were going in an out and my friend and I managed to get seats. We had arrived shortly after 7pm so the royal wedding had already started and was being projected onto one of the walls. They had some snacks and nibbles at the front near the counter as it was a special occasion.

What I noticed straight away was their wide range of drinks selection not to mention that you can buy wine by the glass, which you can't in a lot of places in Seoul/Korea or you can't find it altogether. They also had a great selection of cocktails, non-alcoholic cocktails, smoothies, coffees and teas. My friend and I were talking about our impression of the cafe and our evening in general on the way home and she said she liked that everyone had made an effort to dress up and seemed in high spirit. Also some girls at the counter near our table were talking about whether William and Kate would kiss and I interjected "Even royalty kiss you know!" and we bantered about that for a bit and she thought that was really great as she said it's not really Korean culture to talk to strangers. The atmosphere of the cafe was more like a pub, lively and fun, again I'm not sure if it's normally like that on a friday night or whether the mood was all down to the royal wedding. Either way everyone seemed to be having a good time.

The Korean staff who work behind the counter also speak English so you can call them for directions although if you can find your way to Dankook University you should be able to find the cafe fairly easily. I really enjoyed myself that evening, my only complaint is that they don't have one of these in Seoul.

How to get there: 

Jukjeon station, Bundang Line, come out of Exit 1 (any exit is ok really), take a bus to Dankook University (there are several), there are many cafes and eateries lining the road to the main entrance to Dankook University, Cafe London is a few minutes walk on the left hand side of the road. 

Opening times: Monday-Friday 10am-till late (1ish)

                         Saturdays and Sundays 10:30am-till late (1ish)

E-mail: cafelondoninfo@gmail.com

Website:www.cafelondon.co.kr

Article: http://www.10mag.com/2011/05/gyeonggi-cafe-london/