So, after our 2 weeks of travelling by train it was great to be back in the van and have some freedom back. As L’viv is fairly close to the border with Poland (our next destination) we envisaged a couple of hours driving then maybe an hour or so going through the usual formalities to leave Ukraine and enter Poland. We had no such luck.
After enjoying our 2 hours of freedom driving west at 1pm we hit a queue full of Polish and Ukrainian vehicles, which we guessed to be the border crossing. We were instantly offered the chance (using a combination of Ukrainian, charades and pictionary) to queue-jump: only 30 dollars/euros/hryvnia (we had several offers from several different dodgy-looking guys). Being cheap and also from Britain – where queue-jumping is considered a social evil – we naturally refused their persistent offers. We were told therefore we’d have to queue for maybe 10 hours (until 11pm) to get to the border – we assumed they were probably exaggerating but still, this we could deal with.
After witnessing a frustrating number of other people paying to push in further up the queue and having lunch and dinner in the van it was dark and we started taking turns in getting some sleep on the bed in the back of the van. After 3 hour shifts through the night we finally made it to the Ukrainian exit border at 6am after a wait of 17 hours. (The queue from when we joined it to the front was only about 140 cars and maybe 500m long, so our average speed was an impressive 29 metres an hour!) Here we had the van thoroughly searched for the first time on the trip and then queued a further 7 hours waiting to get to the Polish frontier 200 metres away.
The shining, golden gates of the EU were so close! When we got to the Polish border we joined the queue for EU citizens (which of course the cheating, queue-jumping Ukrainians couldn’t get into. ha) and were through in minutes after a quick check and showing some photos of our trip to the Polish customs guy! I love the EU.
Total time to cross the border: 26 hours. Total distance covered: 1,500 metres.
The cost of Moscow and trains and actually PAYING for accommodation eventually got to my (Will’s, obviously) student budgeting psyche, it is definitely time to head back Nevilwards.
On the way back to the car park in L’viv we made a weekend stop in Kiev to complement our tour of former Soviet capitals. Making more use of couch surfing we stayed with a guy called Alexey who lives in a wicked central flat with his girlfriend and a small kitten (called tit). Alexey was a great host and after meeting us from the station and feeding us showed us the sites of Kiev. The city is a lot less rectangular than Minsk and Moscow and the architects steered clear of the “bigger is better” mentality, there are also hills and we found the top of one with a great park and views over the river and Dinamo Kiev’s stadium. As with the rest of Eastern Europe Saturday seems to be getting married day. We shared our park with about seven or eight individual happy couples, all followed by an entourage of photographers, film crews, friends, relatives, small dogs and mother inlaws. It was great fun, Ben managed to get three brides in one photo.
In the evening we found our favourite Ukrainian cafeteria chain, “Pazata Khata”, before Alexey took us down several dark alleys; all of which seemed to have trendy hidden bars at the end! Sunday was once more grey, so we went to the beach on the river and had a beer. Some guy was swimming! or maybe he was washing… The grey skies have recently prompted Ben to say, and I quote, “I’m definitely not going to complain about the weather as much when I get back home… well not in Autumn or Spring anyway.” You heard it here first.
We left Kiev on the night train for L’viv with a good overall impression. The city had a weekend quiet about it, but there were lots of people in the bars and cafes despite the seemingly empty streets. There are some tastefully grand Orthodox churches and the President lets you walk right outside his house! For a change everyone was friendly and patient at our inventive communication skills; rarely using language, masters of pictionary.
Its worth mentioning that our plans changed somewhat upon hanging around in Lviv. We decided to leave the van in some “secure” parking (I certainly wouldn’t mess with the attendant, but you wouldn’t have to if you walked through a hole in the fence) in Lviv and complete a brief former USSR taster trip on the train. A number of reasons compelled us to leave Nevil out in the cold:
- It gives us a chance for a bit of a change. Experiencing Russian trains.
- A break from cold mornings
- Ensures we are totally broke upon return (not used to all this paying for accomodation lark and there are no hostels)
- We looked at a map
After our previous border crossing attempts, most of which since leaving western Europe have resulted in us parting with money or bottles of wine, we were a little apprehensive approaching the Ukrainian border. As with all the other border-crossing shenanigans we’ve had all would have gone smoothly if I (Ben) had sorted out international insurance properly. But since leaving Slovenia we’ve been effectively uninsured and so border officials have been a little wary of letting us enter the country. However, we tried our usual tactic of playing dumb and with a little bit of creative story-telling they eventually let us in.
After some jokes trying to work out what all the signs in cyrillic were pointing to (L’viv for example is spelt: лвов) we rolled off the road and parked up in a field for the night. Next day we made it to L’viv, the main city in western Ukraine. Tourism isn’t very big here and as a result there were no backpacking hostels to stay in with the usual collection of British, Aussies and Canadians to share travel tips and beers with. So instead we found a soviet-era hotel to stay at for 5 quid a night.
Although L’viv was visually very nice, there wasn’t much to do other than see yet more churches.
Because I’m lazy and can’t be bothered to write in sentences (just been on a long train journey into Belarus and am v tired) some observations about Ukraine…
-Almost all Ukrainians girls here massively overdo it with the makeup and the vast majority also wear uncomfortable-looking (presumably “fashionable”?) knee-length boots and black. Seems to work for the Ukrainian guys!
-The streets are hugely busy at all times of day and queues for the buses and trams are massive.
-A tram ride costs 5pence
-A (good) beer costs maximum 50pence
-Petrol/diesel is 40p/litre
-A meal costs a quid
Am sure I could think of more interesting things to say another time, but this will have to do for now!
