We’d be heading out for our 18 day vacation in South Korea soon, and here is my short post commenting on the gear and toys I’d be bringing over for the trip this time. We’d been watching of course the ongoing political tension within the country now over the botched declaration of martial law by South Korea’s president several days back, and simultaneously there is a strike by workers in their national rail company – but we’ll comment about that in a different post.
The list of gear that is coming for this trip:
Sony A6600 with the Sigma 18-50mm f2.8 DN lens: I almost decided to leave this at home, since in the two trips I’ve had this year so far – to Cebu, and also recently a work trip to Arizona and San Francisco – I survived fine without it. But I was browsing through my notes for our Japan trip in Dec 2023, and remembered that I did get a decent amount of use out from the Sony AA6600 then. So, this is returning to my backpack for South Korea, though the 18-135mm lens is staying home this time as the longer reach possible through this zoom lens would be covered by the Sony RX100 VII.
Sony RX100 VII: this little compact saw little use in Cebu and my USA work-trip, so here’s hoping that this will finally get some serious love in South Korea. It’s a capable compact, and I imagine I’d likely want to use it for quick street photos rather than hauling out the still not that diminutive AA600 + 18-50mm lens to take pictures of urban places.
DJI Drones: these are staying home – and a bummer. Basically, I listed all the places this coming trip I would have loved to get aerial photos and videos of. and of the list of 12 places, I read that all but two prohibited drones or required you to apply for permissions. And the remaining two of 12 were still iffy about whether flying drones would be permitted. Certainly for Seoul at least, apart from a designated park for enthusiasts to fly to their hearts’ contents, drone flying was strictly disallowed.
DJI Action 3: unlike our Cebu trip, we have no plans to go swimming this winter in South Korea, so this is also staying home.
The other gear that is coming include the Asus Zenbook S13 – I adore this ultraportable for its great OLED display, that it’s pretty light and compact, and offers sufficient power for photo and video editing when traveling. This has been one of my best purchases this year of 2024, more so considering that I got it for a bargain, and I’ve not seen the S13 sold again at such a low price since my picking it up in February this year. And also, for on the go blogging, it’d be the Samsung Tab S9 that the missus bought me for my birthday last year. This 1 year old tablet has accompanied me for all the overseas trips, and still works well: except that the Samsung OEM folio keyboard is showing wear and tear now.
The three phones between all of us that would likely discharge most photo-taking and video duties are two Samsung S24 Ultras, and a Samsung S21 Ultra that the daughter has taken over. Yep, we’re through and through a Samsung phone family LOL.
And that’s it for the gear. Our next post will be our Day 01 post of our trip!