Massandra Yalta

... on the Black Sea and also just many tales of life when the Ukraine was part of the Soviet Union. It was all very interesting and I enjoyed the experience very much. He was a few years younger than me and it is amazing that so much was happening in the world when I could have been paying attention to it and just didn’t. It shows how different upbringings can be. My parents never taught us or showed us to be aware of what ...

... daarna zelfgebakken broodjes met kaas, brood met yogurt, gebakken vis en een soort pasta. Ik geef toe beetje heftig maar erg smakelijk en ze eten gezellig mee. Daar blijft het niet bij want voor onderweg krijgen we nog meer broodjes, geitenkaas, tomaten, druiven, een meloen, verse koeienmelk en brood mee. Na een rondleiding in de bus worden we door al onze buurtjes van die nacht uitgezwaaid ;-)
2 uur later komen we in Odesa ...

... where we proceeded to get extremely drunk... The beer was relatively cheap from the little stalls dotting the path, it was good and wholesome, 8% in strength, called Baltica 9, and Jon's weaker Baltica 3, Russian beer at its best. The Ukrainian holiday makers walked on by, passed on by in a blur of faces, colors and screams, bikes and pedalos, electric and manual weaving through the throng, a Jack Sparrow in a mohican zebra-cycle playing guitar renditions of smooth jazz ...

... good. We went back to the rest of the people, and finally went to the sea. The secret and in the same time the "hardcore" of our trip to sea was that we wanted to have a "wild trip" thats mean that we should stay in a place which is nor designed for beaching and in general to do something like a nomad camping. Now we were heading toward a beach, located inside a park, for this we entered ilegal, through a break into the wall, had a hard trip going down from a hill ...

During Soviet times, Yalta, on the Black Sea, was the vacation location of the masses. Today, it continues in that role, though perhaps with slightly less panache. the city's setting on the Crimean coast is spectacular, as was our ride from Sevastopol yesterday. It's really too bad the Soviets had to ruin it with hideous architecture. Paradise, Yalta is not, but after 50 weeks in a cramped, gray, Moscow apartment, I can see how Yalta's packed, pebbly beaches ...

... the guide, her daughter and the driver. They helped me with the menu and I ended up with some tasty lamb skewers. The guide's daughter even gave me demo of the traditional dances. After that it was back up and down the winding road to Yalta. It was a bit scary, the road wasn't very big and in some places there was no kind of barrier to stop us from rolling over the cliff. Made it back safe and sound and decided to give the cable car a go to get another view of town. That was ...

... them, so I asked some people getting off "Boryspil?" One shook his head and one answer back "city" in English. So I crossed the street and caught an identically minibus going in the opposite direction. I don't think the picture of the planes meant anything, that one didn't go to the airport either. After I was the last one left on the minibus, the driver asked me something of that I couldn't decipher. A guy at the hostel had taught me the proper way to say areoport and ...

... most of it reading Malcom Bradbury's "Doctor Crimanale," which of course you should rush out and buy, too. After tomorrrow's excursion, I'll have one more day in tourist heaven and then another driver will take me to the airport in Simferopol on Wednesday to catch my flight back to Kiev. Bonus advice: Never order a martini in Yalta. It did contain gin but was drowned in vermouth and came in a highball glass with a slice of lemon and two olives. Something has been lost in translation.

... some tourists to Bakchysaray in fog much like this. When they came to the main medieval gate to park, it had slowly swung open and Tatar warriors in their helmets and bristling with lances and sabers began to emerge on horseback through the chowdery fog. Several dramatic moments passed before they realized someone was filming a movie there that day. He also recalled being about 12 years old and coming into his hometown to find red Nazi flags hung from the palace's walls ...

... most efforts to capture them with cameras showed only water and blurs, but thanks to our colleague Clark for these shots with a telephoto lens). Seeing where the Yalta conference was held and hearing some of the details behind-the-scenes was fascinating (like the many hours it took to travel there by land from ...