Hotel Izumrud Uzhhorod

... Talia is up and down when it comes to bedtime. The first night was a bit of a struggle, as we figured it would be, but the next night she said "Hoshesh spate" which is "i want to sleep" and off she went to climb into bed. And then last night was a little tough again. When she finally goes to sleep though, man she sleeps! She probably learned to be a pretty heavy sleeper sharing the room in the orphanage with 10 other ...

... buildings, deeper potholes and lots of Ladas and Skodas of which some were older than me. I saw only the south west of this big country but from what I saw and felt in and around Uzhhorod, it seemed to be stagnating. The people seemed much more used to keeping their heads down , most businesses had private security and there were more cars with blacked out windows than not. The countryside however, was much like Slovakia and ...

... while you traversing it, you die or jump. The first bridge was no problem or more accurately no train. The second involved a hastily aborted mission.

The advertised 20 km by road to Kosice turned into 20km as the Joesph flys.

We met a couple of Joesph and Viera´s friends on the way into Kosice and the four of them escorted me through the city and on to a campsite which was under and next to motorways. We grank a lot of beer together ...

Vecer po velkom okruhu juhovychodom Slovenska mame este cas sa trochu poprechadzat po centre Michaloviec pred tym ako odideme do nasho penzionu na brehoch Zemplinskej Siravy v dedine s priznacnym nazvom Kaluza. Zajtra teda mame prvy den oddychu ked nebudeme robit nic len spat a lezat na brehu Siravy.

Z Ciernej nad Tisou pokracujeme do jednej z naslavnejsich a mozno aj najslavnejsej vino produkujucej oblasti Slovenska - do Tokaja. Cestu na Tokaj sme nasli v pohode, ale dostat sa do Malej a Velkej Trne bola vcelku zdlhava zalezistost, pretoze sme pobludili po chotaroch aspon troch obci a nasli niektore osady v okoli Slvenskeho noveho mesta, ktore sme teda rozhodne nehladali. Nakoniec sme sa ale nasli a stastlivo dorazili do pivnic Velkej Trne.

Vcera sme obsolvovali cestu severovychodom Slovenka a dnes mame pre zmenu na plane jeho Juhovychodny cip. Vyrazame z Humenneho a nas prvy ciel je Cierna nad Tisou. Do Ciernej so sa chcel uz velmi dlho pozriet. Neviem ci je to preto, ze je to uplne na hraniciach alebo ze ked sa clovek pozrie na mapu Slovenska, tak z Bratislavy je len malo miest tak velmi vzdialenych. No tak ci onak dnes ideme prave tam!

Z Medzilaboriec sme pokracovali dalej cez Sninu. Cestou nam takmer podvozok zostal na miestnych rozbitych cestach, ale nakoniec sme stastne dorazili do Humanneho. Ubytovali sme sa nedaleko niekdajsej fabriky Chemlonu Humenne znameho po celom Slovensku ...

... we were in west ucraina and must to head to crimea, that is 2 days by train. But the ticket were bought, we said goodbuy to all the friends who where staying, made our backpacks, had the last drink, e-mail exchanges. we head to the elecktrichca train, and here I met the spirit of SSSR - we paid less than we should be paying for 12 people, but we went without tickets. The conductor explained to us that she must sell a specific amount of ...

... psyankas! After the castle my buddy left to catch her bus and I headed next door to the open air museum. It was a group of about 15 old houses, a church and a school house from old villages. It looked like something right out of Little House on the Prairie. It even had some sheep wandering around and the ladies working at each house were raking or gardening on the sides if there were no groups around. After that I went to the mall in search of internet and then shopped around the ...

... person spoke a single word of english!! Not the train conductor, not the border control guards, not the customs lady, not the lady selling tickets, not the person that illegally exchanged money for me, and not any other passengers. If I didn't know the 10 or so phrases and 15 or so numbers in Russian that I do, well I don't know where I would be right now. I probably would have played schrades with the ticket ...