2018 Winter Olympics Tickets

[gordarpi]

Thanks very much for the hint, will look around on the Korean site for further routes and corresponding details. The TS31 and other services' frequency is quite reassuring, similar to some of the bus intervals we have seen in Sochi.

 

[seabm7]

The City-to-City Bus Network in Korea

This review is just a plan B.

There are two city-to-city bus networks in Korea. They let you select the seat during online reservation. However, a phone number is required for reservation, so I'm not sure if you can utilize it in the current form.

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1) The Express Bus System

https://www.kobus.co.kr/main.do

The language selection button is at the upper right corner of the homepage: Korean, English, Chinese, and Japanese.

This network uses two terminals in Seoul for the buses to Gangneung:

* Seoul Gyeongbu Line: One of the buildings in a huge transport complex in Gangnam (the River South). The buildings are modern, but you can get lost and may end up in a different bus line. From this terminal, it takes 2 hours and 50 mins to Gangneung Bus Terminal.

* Dongseoul (= East Seoul) : The 2nd floor of a very old building (Do not use bathrooms here). From this terminal, it takes 2 hours and 20 mins to Gangneung Bus Terminal.

The tickets for the New Year Holiday period (Feb 14-18) are already open and still available.

---

2) The Intercity Bus System

* https://txbuse.t-money.co.kr/otck/trmlInfEnty.do

The language selection button is at the upper right corner of the homepage: Korean and English. I noticed that the interface is ridden with bugs. If you want to change the inquiry detail, you have to clear out every slots by hand first.

* There is another reservation site,

https://www.bustago.or.kr/newweb/kr/index.do

But English version at this site does not work properly.

This network uses the 1st floor of EastSeoul (=Dongseoul) Terminal. Do not use bathrooms here. Make sure selecting the 2 hour 20 min duration, not the 2 hour 40 min duration. The intercity buses are cheaper, but they go around and stop frequently.

They open tickets one month in advance for selected routes during the Olympic days. Otherwise they open one week in advance, or they simply sell tickets first come first served on the spot.

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* East Seoul (=Dongseoul) Terminal hosts the Express Network on the 2nd floor and the Intercity Network on the 1st floor. The City Government has a plan to construct a new building in 2019.

* Gangneung Terminal hosts the Express Network in one wing and the Intercity Network in the other wing. The buses to Incheon Airport leave from the Intercity Network wing.

* There are many bus terminals in Seoul. Please make sure which terminal you are going, or you may be ended at a wrong one. Last summer, I found a person who was trying to go to Gangneung from Nambuterminal (South Seoul), which is only two subway stations away from Seoul Gyeongbu Line. This Intercity Bus terminal does not serve Gangneung.

 

[Triplecomb]

Ok, so I just tried buying a ticket via the official website for one of the practice sessions, but a Visa is needed for payment. I only have a MasterCard. Has anyone with a Visa tried purchasing a ticket?

You can find the practice tickets by selecting the date on which the practice takes place in the calendar.

One again, if anyone is able to buy them, please PM me.

You can buy it with a PostPay.

 

[kiches]

I saw Category A for Ladies' free skate pop up on the PyeongChang site, they seem to be gone (or in people's carts). If anyone wants one, I have one sitting in my cart for the next 54 min.

 

[Paval]

I'm not sure if anyone can help me, I have a Pyeongchang Korail pass for the olympics but its not letting me reserve seats from the 14th onward. Are they sold out, can foreigners not reserve? Or are they not released yet? The website isn't very clear. If foreigners cant reserve do i just show up to the train I want to catch and hope for the best. I'm worried cause I've read its their new year and trains will be hard to get, I have tickets to the pairs events and i'm worried I wont get there in time. Would it better to go the bus route even though its a longer travel time?

 

[pyeongchang1745]

Sales for Pyeongchang Winter Olympics 2018!

Hi, guys.
I'm a figure skating fan from South Korea.

I would like to sell my tickets to you guys, in a regular price.


The tickets that I'll sell are..

GMT +9 (Seoul)

Feb. 20.
10:00 - 13:45

Ice Dance : Free Dance
Seat : A
amount : 2 (in a row)

and

Free Dance as well,
Seat : B
amount : 2 (in a row)


4 tickets in total.


The view of each seat is really good, so I hope you to buy my tickets.. plz...

I am so worried that my tickets will not be sold until the Olympics...

I spent too much on it.. so help me plz..



If you have an idea, please contact me with my E-mail : [email protected]

(You cannot contact me with the E-mail on my profile!)


Then, I'll be waiting for your mails!

BYE

 

[seabm7]

Hi, guys.

I'm a figure skating fan from South Korea.

I would like to sell my tickets to you guys, in a regular price.

There is a ticket sale thread here:

https://www.goldenskate.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?115-Figure-Skating-For-Sale

You can post your information there.

 

[Triplecomb]

I'm looking for buy train ticket from Seul to Gangneung.

 

[seabm7]

I'm not sure if anyone can help me, I have a Pyeongchang Korail pass for the olympics but its not letting me reserve seats from the 14th onward. Are they sold out, can foreigners not reserve? Or are they not released yet? The website isn't very clear. If foreigners cant reserve do i just show up to the train I want to catch and hope for the best. I'm worried cause I've read its their new year and trains will be hard to get, I have tickets to the pairs events and i'm worried I wont get there in time. Would it better to go the bus route even though its a longer travel time?

For the New Year Holiday period (Feb 14-18), the English reservation website will open on January 17th 16:00 KST, both for the rail passes and single tickets. All the other days are already open for reservation.

If you need more information, here is my post on the situation:

https://goldenskate.com/forum/showt...pics-Tickets&p=1904481&viewfull=1#post1904481


My understanding is that Gangneung is a sparsely populated area, so the demand from the people who want to visit their relatives during the holiday period is not huge. There is a speculation that the competition for the train tickets during this period would be mostly among the Olympic spectators.

---

ETD: For the pair days, there are two variables:

1) The North Korean pairs: The negotiation for the wild card will start on January 20th. If their participation gets confirmed, the demand for the pair tickets and the train tickets will go up.

2) The Chinese spectators: The relation between South Korea and China is still in the cooled state, which is limiting the number of Chinese spectators. Once the relation got warmed, there will be more demand on the pair tickets and the train tickets.

---

ETD2: As for the bus routes, I did a summary here:

https://www.goldenskate.com/forum/s...pics-Tickets&p=1920057&viewfull=1#post1920057

The English interface of the Express Bus Network is good, but they require a phone number as an identification tool, which may be a problem for oversea visitors. The Pyeongchang organizers have been talking of the "Go Pyeongchang" app as an multi-language comprehensive transport tool for spectators, but there has been no news on its status yet.

 

[annemn]

Hi folks! I'm afraid I've found this thread pretty late, but I've scanned as much as I can and don't think this has been asked before (apologies if I'm wrong about that):

First off, is there a separate thread for folks who are attending the Games to discuss logistics? I don't want to clutter up the Tickets thread if so...

If not, I was wondering if anyone knows about other figure skating-related non-officially-ticketed side events that are going on during the games? Aside from the officially-ticketed practice ("Training") sessions, are there meet & greets with the skaters, autograph-signing sessions, anything else like that I might be missing?

I was sadly too late for most of the practice session tickets, so I'm trying to make sure I don't miss anything else!

 

[Spiccine]

Hi, sorry to intrude like this, I just want to say thank you to @seabm7 for all the useful informations I found here and that there is also a fb group called "Pyeongchang Olympics 2018 (KTX fan? club)", created after all the Korail and Seollal's mess, where you can find some informations. Maybe it would be useful to someone else either. Btw I managed to buy bus tickets on Kobus using a fake korean number. Have a nice day!

 

[seabm7]

Hi, sorry to intrude like this, I just want to say thank you to @seabm7 for all the useful informations I found here and that there is also a fb group called "Pyeongchang Olympics 2018 (KTX fan? club)", created after all the Korail and Seollal's mess, where you can find some informations. Maybe it would be useful to someone else either. Btw I managed to buy bus tickets on Kobus using a fake korean number. Have a nice day!

I hope you would not need the plan B bus tickets at the end. But if you have to, be careful to figure out which bus terminal you are using. There are many bus terminals in Seoul, which itself is very confusing. For example in the River South area (Gangnam), there are three major bus terminals. When the metropolitan population got overshoot, the government built extra buildings nearby, which created a cluster of bus terminals.

* The original Seoul Express Terminal has two wings: Gyeongbu Line and Yeongdong Line. At the KOBUS website, both Gyeongbu Line and Yeongdong Line are categorized under the Seoul Gyeongbu Line. In fact, it is Yeongdong Line which serves Gangneung. Frequently, Gyeongbu Line implicitly includes Yeongdong Line in traffic signs. "Gyeongbu" means Seoul to Busan. "Yeongdong" means East of mountains.

* Accross a main street, there is Central City Terminal, which houses Seoul Honam line. "Honam" means South of Lake. This one does not serve Gangneung.

* Two subway stations away, there is Nambuterminal (South Seoul), which is an intercity bus terminal. This does not serve Gangneung, either.

 

[Spiccine]

I hope you would not need the plan B bus tickets at the end. But if you have to, be careful to figure out which bus terminal you are using. There are many bus terminals in Seoul, which itself is very confusing. For example in the River South area (Gangnam), there are three major bus terminals. When the metropolitan population got overshoot, the government built extra buildings nearby, which created a cluster of bus terminals.

* The original Seoul Express Terminal has two wings: Gyeongbu Line and Yeongdong Line. At the KOBUS website, both Gyeonbu Line and Yeongdong Line are categorized under the Seoul Gyeongbu Line. In fact, it is Yeongdong line which serves Gangneung. "Gyeongbu" means Seoul to Busan. "Yeongdong" means East of mountains.

* Accross a main street, there is Central City Terminal, which houses Seoul Honam line. "Honam" means South of Lake. This one does not serve Gangneung.

* Two subway stations away, there is Nambuterminal (South Seoul), which is an intercity bus terminal. This does not serve Gangneung, either.

I hope that too, but I'm not very positive about getting a KTX ticket either. Thanks for your advice, since we are staying near Cheongnyangni we chose Dongseoul as bus terminal, hoping it was a good choice.

 

[carmen7077]

To anyone who's interested in getting a men's free skating ticket, cosport now have men's free back in inventory. If I remember correctly you'll be picking up the ticket by yourself in Gangneung, they no longer offer delivery now.

 

[seabm7]

As a reference, this is the current (January 16th, 11:50 KST) situation of February 23rd, Ladies' Free day of the KTX tickets:

Train Number	Station	Station	Station
833	Seoul (6:00)	Cheongnyangni (6:21)	Gangneung (7:58)	Sold out for reserved seats
853		Cheongnyangni (6:40)	Gangneung (8:18)	Available
873		Sangbong (7:05)	Gangneung (8:39)	Available
835	Seoul (7:00)	Sangbong (7:24)	Gangneung (8:58)	Sold out for reserved seats
855		Cheongnyangni (7:40)	Gangneung (9:18)	Available
875		Sangbong (8:00)	Gangneung (9:35)	Available
801	Seoul (8:00)	Cheongnyangni (8:21)	Gangneung (9:57)	Available (Starting from Incheon Airport)

For this particular day, each train has 7 reserved seat cars + 1 non-reserved seat car = 8 cars. During the New Year Holiday season, all the 8 cars will be reserved cars. Each train set has the capacity of 410 people.

 

[kiches]

Got an email from Korail just now, maybe someone can help me interpret this because I'm not really seeing anything that actually helps the situation.

Dear valued customer,



We truly appreciate and welcome everyone who are visiting Korea for Olympic Winter Games Pyeongchang 2018. And thank you for your interest and support on Pyeongchang Korail Pass.



KORAIL has opened new KTX 'Gyunggang Line' on December 2017 which provides the most safe and fast transportation to reach olympic venues.

Furthermore, we have developed foreigner-only railway pass called 'Pyeongchang Korail Pass' in order to let foreign visitors to explore Korea with KORAIL conveniently.



As we have announced beforehand, seat reservation of KTX(Incheon-Seoul ↔ Gangneung station) for Seollal period(February 14th to 18th 2018) will be open from January 17th 16:00P.M.(Korean standard time).

However, to resolve hardships that Pyeongchang Korail Pass holders may face, we have made additional special reservation plan as follows:



- Special reservation period: January 25th 10:00A.M. to January 29th 16:00P.M. (Korean Standard Time)

- Available trains: KTX(Incheon-Seoul ↔ Gangneung station) for Seollal period(February 14th to 18th 2018) only

- Limited option: 2 seats per person for a day & up to 6 seats per person during the Seollal period in total



The option limit is given for fair provision to every passholder within limited seat capacities. Therefore, we would like to appreciate your understandings in advance, and we recommend you to make seat reservation carefully in accordance with your itinerary.



In addition, if you cannot reserve seats for the Seollal period, you can get on train with standing tickets at any time within valid period.

Please note that hardcopy(printed-out) pass must be possessed with you when you request seat at stations or board trains.



Thank you for your understandings and cooperation.

We sincerely want you to have pleasure time in Korea with KORAIL.

So this is my take away from this notice, not sure if they released this info in other languages and others can let us know if they read the information the same way in other languages:

- From Jan 25, 10 AM - Jan 29, 4 PM, EVERYONE (Pyeongchang Korail Pass holders and non pass holders) are restricted to booking up to 2 trips per person, with a max of 6 trips per person between the dates of Feb 14-18 for the 'Gyunggang Line'.
- Outside of Jan 25-29 you can reserve as many seats on the 'Gyunggang Line' as you want? And other lines as well?
- If you actually have events you need to travel for each day between Feb 14-18 you can't book and seats for these 5 consecutive days as you'd max out the 6 trips per person, unless you book reserve the seats outside of Jan 25-29?

If reservations ran out it sounds like this wouldn't help anyone.

 

[seabm7]

- Those without a pass booking one-way tickets can book as much as they can get a reservation for without restriction?

During the New Year Holiday period, they limit total number of tickets per person anyway. I'm not sure of the English site, but it's plausible they impose the same limit.

 

[kiches]

During the New Year Holiday period, they limit total number of tickets per person anyway at the Korean website. I'm not sure of the English site, but it's plausible they impose the same limit.

Sorry, I edited my original post as I was re-reading the notice so I deleted that comment as I realized it's probably a limit for everyone.

The problem is the English in this notification is very poor and open to a lot of misinterpretation, is the max 6 trip reservation between this period actually only for non-pass holders, or does it include pass holders? Otherwise I don't see how this is supposed to help the situation. If it applies to pass holders as well that means they can't book roundtrip seats for each day between Feb 14-18, and if they're staying in Seoul it could mean they're screwed?

 

[seabm7]

- Limited option: 2 seats per person for a day & up to 6 seats per person during the Seollal period in total

I just called the customer service of Korail. They say this is the number of seats you can reserve during the special reservation period of January 25th-29th for the Pyeongchang pass. You can reserve additional seats outside the special reservation period. In addition, they say you can also stand, but they limit the number of standing people and you have to make sure everything at the Korail office as soon as you arrive in Korea.

 

[kiches]

I just called the customer service of Korail. They say this is the number of seats you can reserve during the special reservation period of January 25th-29th for the Pyeongchang pass. You can reserve additional seats outside the special reservation period.

Thanks for calling seabm7! I was wondering how I could call them from overseas without having to call long distance. I do wonder if this decision means they don't expect a the trains to be fully booked within the first day of open reservation.