Hotel Codru Chisinau

... Communism. Sunday became just another day. Conversely so it is for relatively religious America, while Catholic/Atheistic France clings like beggar lice to the traditional Sunday holiday picnic, like it or not. Go figure. <br><br>So the first thing I do in a new city is scope out onward transportation- convenient since I&#8217;m usually in a bus or train station- especially in a backwater place like Chisinau. In the old USSR of ...

... were torn up when we discovered that the 'overnight' Chisinau-Lviv train left at 11am and got in at 7am the following morning, so 20 hours for a 350ish km trip or 17km/h on average. Even with the state of the roads the buses were quicker than this, but to avoid over-doing it we decided to break up the journey and take the bus to Kamyanets-Podilskiy just over the Ukrainian border where we hoped the transport might get a bit better.<br><br> <br>

... with sprinkler system, sink 80cm with huge mirror, toilet, electrical ventilator, 5 spots in ceiling, wash / drying machine <br> &gt;&gt; good cool in summer and very good working heating in winter <br> <br> Details pro object <br> Stefan Cel Mare 64 ap 15 <br> &gt; cozy, warm fully modern 1 bedroom renovated ...

Bus ride from Odessa to Chisinau had some strange aspects to it. The potentially 3h ride took close to 7 hours. A good percentage of the passengers were thrown out at various border stations because of lacking documents, and left there, crying. Pretty close to Chisinau, we hear a loud bang and one of the windows of the bus shatters. Apparently someone just threw a good sized rock into it. The driver and a ...

... trees and many parks. A very attractive City and I feel slightly guilty that until 6 months ago I was unaware of the existence of the Republic of Moldova. Bessarabia is part of Moldova, people of my generation may remember a sketch by Michael Bentine where wine was being taken with the Ambassador of Bessarabia. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A5WP8ZvB bHE In 1989 before the peaceful overthrow of Communism, Ion and his wife Katinka were part of a 200 ...

... as death approaches. Amazingly, our source of information again came from Claude's German skills - I continue to be dazzled at how widely spoken German is, and how useless my equivalent level of pidgin French is. Once aboard the train, we attempted sleep secure in the knowledge that at least we were not to be stranded here any further. At least the journey was a short one, with both Lonely Planet and the web confirming we would be in Chisinau in eight ...

... news that my suitcase hadn't arrived. As it contained every single piece of clothing I had, and the handstitched tablecloths Les' sister Elizabeth had made for me, I was absolutely devastated. But, the life of the traveler must go on. We were checked into an absolutely beautiful hotel and then went for dinner to an authentic Romanian restaurant. Great food, a ton of wine, and a local band playing in the background. Almost enough to make me forget my luggage!

... but the guys I did talk with had interesting things to say, often talking about relatives of theirs that are now living in Brooklyn and such. Apart from that, I spent the day basically wandering around Chisinau's sprawling central grid of leafy streets. This is a very green city, with just about every single street in the downtown area lined on both sides with tall trees. In the midst of all this are two significantly large parks, so the metropolis definitely has some ...

I have made it this far! "The end of the line." according to Let's Go! It is a strange place, but we have managed to find a place to stay and get a ticket to Romania for tommarow night. All is well except that the water and fake crab make me feel sick.