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| Playa - fields and workers |
While at the Buhta Viking Resort in L’viv, we met a
lovely Ukrainian woman, Sveta from Kiev, who was holidaying with her family.
She suggested that we head south to Uzhgorod and the Carpathian Mountains,
which we did the next day.
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| Kosova church |
The drive south was lovely.
It showed us beautiful
countryside, small neat villages, stunning churches, and people working the
fields.
As we had planned to stay the night in Uzhgorod, we
drove around for a while until we found a sign for a hotel that we might use
for parking.
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| Uzhgorod Castle-Marg |
All good – the place was not a typical hotel, but provided
accommodation for children and their families, and schooled using the
Montessori Method.
The lovely owner spoke good English and was happy
for us to park in the quiet and secluded back car park.
The next morning, armed with instructions and a
map, we navigated into town seeking Vanni sized parking, which we found without
too much effort.
We then walked along the river and across a
pedestrian bridge into the old city of Uzhgorod.
There were cobbled streets,
restaurants by the river, charming old buildings, grand churches, and a castle.
At the castle, we wandered around the bastions, and
visited the museum which contained an interesting range of articles from the
city’s past.
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| Uzhgorod castle cellar - Leigh |
Each series of rooms had a woman guarding things
and in the main part, the woman asked us where we were from (at least that is
what we thought she said), and was so excited when we said New Zealand.
She
took special care to show us the way to go around the exhibits.
When we came to leave her area she gave us both a
kiss on the cheek and lots of smiles!
After lots more walking, we found ourselves a café
on the river for lunch before heading out of town.
We noticed that in almost every village, people
used a horse and cart to travel, take their produce to market, or move hay,
etc.
It was amazing how many times we found ourselves
driving behind a horse and cart.
As we would not reach our next destination that
day, we overnighted in a service station in Stryi.
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| Uzhgorod horse & Cart |
Next day, we headed toward the south-west of
Ukraine on an ‘M’ highway (supposed to be the better level of road), and were
shocked at the condition of the bitumen.
The road was a mass of pot holes that were deep and
dangerous.
So we zigzagged our way along the road wondering when it was going to
improve!
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| Berezhany roads |
It didn’t!
Rather than continue on this road we decided to
head north again, to get back onto our original road toward L’viv.
Joy of joys,
it was a real road again!
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| Cows on road-Bibrka |
Between dodging the potholes, skirting horse and
carts, and avoiding the ever-present cows, we each gave whoops of joy when we
reached 60 mph!
As we had to backtrack toward L’viv to get
half-decent roads, we decided to overnight back at Buhta Viking Resort.
There
we were greeted with great joy by Irina, the manager and settled back into our
old spot.
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| L’viv camp snake |
A wonderful night’s sleep was had by us both in preparation for
another Ukrainian breakfast.
We managed to do another load of washing and then
had a small encounter with a tiny snake that didn’t seem to like us!
We asked
Irina about it and when she heard how small it was she laughed and said it was
quite harmless.
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| Election day- Berezhany |
We were not keen on it and dispatched it much further away from
us with a broom and shovel!
The next day we saw another one and moved that on
too!
After a couple of days of relaxing we were back on
the road, which happened to be the day of the Ukraine national election.
It was interesting travelling on election-day
during this time of crisis in Ukraine.
As we drove through the various villages
and townships, we passed lots of people in their best dress, walking in small
groups and clustering outside, what we assumed where the election booth
buildings.
A few days later we heard about the election results which, in the
west of Ukraine, seems to be a popular result.
Next stop, Ternopil in the south-west.