Viva la revolution!

Life ain't about waiting for the storm to pass.....Its about learning to dance in the rain.

I'm in Lviv, western Ukraine. In my attempt to do at least one Ukranian city justice I've spent the day looking around the town. It took me a day and a half to get to Lviv. The main roads were all re-surfaced last year when Ukraine and Poland hosted the football so the going was pretty smooth.

The day that I left Rivne was a bit of a drag. Eastern Europe havn't quite got the hang of road signs yet and at Rivne the signs were showing 270kms to Lviv, looking at the map it was more like 200 but its toss up wether you trust Ukranian maps or Ukranian road signs more. Usually the maps are more accurate.

I took this picture a bit later in the day, there was no way I'd cycled 100kms from Rivne. At one point in Russia as I was getting closer to a town the kms on the signs were going up!

It was a pretty uneventful day, until about 5pm. I'd just cycled through a town called Brody and was making a beeline for a place called Olesko when I met this father son team.

 They were doing a bit of sightseeing, visiting some of the old castles and historical sights that are dotted about the area. As we were talking a man and a woman came out of a house a few doors down, man was I surprised when the woman spoke near perfect English to me! She invited me into the house, sat me down and basically told me that I was going to stay for supper, have a shower and tell them all about my trip. Awesome.

The conversation flowed pretty well with the woman, a friend of the mans wife, acting as a translator. He was a retired Soviet air force and Ukranian air force helicopter pilot. He had served 15 years in the Soviet military and 15 years in the Ukranian military after the country became independant. When the USSR split up he was offered Russian citizenship and a comfortable office job by the Kremlin which he turned it down because he 'wanted to help his own country (Ukraine) get back on its feet'. A true Ukranian patriot.

We talked quite a lot about Ukranian politics and in particular corruption and the problems with the current regime. When I left he gave me a flag with the democratic party of Ukraine symbol on it, a pretty cool present, however it fell off the back of my bike somewhere on the road into Lviv. Gutted. Anyway managed to pick up a flyer from the town centre with the same symbol on it so thats going on the bedroom wall when I get home ;).

I stopped in Olesko that night with the signs still showing over 100kms to Lviv. After a good nights sleep I jumped back on the bike and headed off down the road. About 20 minuites later I saw a sign, 60kms to Lviv. Crazy. So a couple of hours later:

Look at that dirty, sweaty unshaven tramp. If he put as much effort into his career as he puts into cycling to obscure places he could have a nice car, a 2 bed semi in the suburbs, a wife and an exciting job selling insurance. Well guys its the dream! hahahahah

Found a hostel easy enough thanks to the free wifi at a petrol station.I didn't do much last night, just monged about. I went to a local takeaway and got some food, two burgers and two large portions of chips for fatty! Opened up the burgers and immediatly realised I'd been done. One word. Salad. The actual burger was about as thick as a piece of paper and they had filled the rest of the bun with green, leafy healthy shit. Errrgh.

Thought the chips would be better...

I didn't cycle to Moscow on bloody salad! Unfortunatly there was no way around it, I had to eat my way through the disgusting healthy rubbish to get to the greasy chippy goodness underneath.

So today I hit the tourist trail in Lviv, its a great town, tonnes of old buildings and stuff to look at. First port of call was Rynok square.

Rynok is the central square in Lviv, it was planned in the second half of the 14th century. A bit of a building site this week as there is some sort of festival going on, but still a pretty beautiful place.

After Rynok I made a beeline for High castle, the highest point in Lviv which promised great views of the city. En route I went through an outdoor market. Behind all of the traders selling I <3 Lviv T-shirts and cuddly toys there were a few bric-a-brac stands. I like these kind of places cause there are always a few hidden treasures. After a bit of a rummage I found a few interesting items which I think make better souviners that a crappy hat or a fridge magnet.

Top left, its a nazi match box holder, not sure if its real or not, the jurys out, but I can't find another one like it on the internet. Top right is an interesting one, pulled it out of a box of junk and paid six quid for it. After a little research on here it turns out its a 'Medal for Labour Valour' it was awarded to:

Labourers who heroically dedicated themselves towards the building of a socialist society or have demonstrated a complete understanding of machinery/equipment to provide a high level of efficiency or for significant contributions in culture/science/manufacturing.

There were over 1.8 million of these medals awarded.

The two bank notes were four quid each, the one on the left is 20 reichsmark, no prizes for guessing what country thats from, and the one on the right is 50 karbowanez from 1942. Its Ukranian money from when the country was occupied by the nazis. Both the notes have the nazi eagle and swastika stamped on them (you can see in the picture).I walked away less than 20 quid lighter with all this history, amasing.

It took me about half an hour to walk to High Castle and climb the hill.

Yeah, I didn't realise there was dirt on the lens until I uploaded it, damn. Still you get the idea. Its the highest point in Lviv at 413m above sea level (its a man-made hill). There really isn't much of the castle left, in the 19th centruy it was made into a park and a Union of Lublin mound was constructed to mark the 300th anniversary of the union. (you can do your own research on the union of Lublin!)

 Met these two massive hawks on the way down!

OK so next port of call was Lychakiv Cemetary, this one looked good on the internet but to be honest it was a bit of a let down. Got there and realised you had to pay to get in, which seemed fairly odd. Anyway I paid (about 80p) then watched about ten people just walk through the gates so I think they're relying a bit too much on peoples good will...

Yep, basically a big creepy cemetery with loads of dead guys and girls. I've met cyclists who've told me that they camp in cemeterys cause they're always quiet at night and the locals don't go near them cause they're scared of evil spirits. Rather you than me my friend.

Hell, this brother makes me look like Brad Pitt!
A lot of the headstones have the dead persons face carved into them.  

This guy must've been a physicist of something. Many of the headstones are crosses but a good percentage are wierd shapes like this. I thought there would be more crosses to be honest cause Ukraine is a pretty religious country.

I left the cemetery after about half an hour and went back into the town, had a crafty beer at one of the local bars. Top tip, try and actually learn some Russian/Ukranian before you come here, people think you're a bit of a nob if you don't speak the language. They speak Russian and Ukranian here but Russian I feel is the dominant language, maybe with a bit of Ukranian mixed in. (for phrases like thank you, please etc.)

The good life.

I went back into the town centre for a bit, took a few pictures of the buildings.

I think its some sort of church. Loads of nuns in Lviv ;) haha! Also had another scam artist try it on today. I was walking down a residential street in the suburbs looking like a proper tourist, bum bag, map in hand etc. when this scruffy young guy comes up to me and tells me that hes a policeman and that he wants to fine me for some misdermeaner. I almost wet myself laughing and told him to F**k off, I did consider givng him 50p for a photo to put on here but when I got my camera out he disappeared very quickly.

Can't remember what this place is! Cool looking building though.

Busker in Lviv!

After my little circuit I headed back to the hostel, picking up a new spare tyre on the way from a local bike shop, for a general chill out and a bit of route planning. I'm two days from the Slovakian border (maybe one If I cut the corner through Poland) targets then are: Bratislav, Vienna, Prague then across Germany to Amsterdam. T-minus 3 weeks till the meet up ;). Gonna be spinning some mega miles to get there on time but it'll be fun.

Adios.

“Tears will get you sympathy, sweat will get you results.”