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Trip Start Aug 23, 1996

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Flag of Ukraine Grenica, Ukraine
Friday, October 5, 2007

I've always believed that you should follow your dreams, so back in 1989, two of mine were killed. I always wanted to cross from West Berlin to East Berlin. The collapse of communism in Eastern Europe finished off the USSR as well, so that was number two done and dusted. In some respects, the loss of East Germany as a country, meant one less to travel to, but with the USSR no longer being, meant a whole load of new countries opened up, and as I was in need of a holiday, I thought it was time to put my stamp on one of the breakaway countries.

Destination Ukraine

There are two reasons to go.

1) The Beatles said that Ukraine girls really knock me out, they leave the West behind, and I needed to know if this is true

And

2) I want a chicken kiev in Kiev !!!

With that settled, being the tight dicks that we are, I bought two tickets to Rzeszow, as they were �300 cheaper, but we did have to get to Stansted under our own steam. This involved catching a 02:00 bus to Sloane Square, walking to Victoria and then another bus to Stansted. It was quite easy actually. Once on the plane, it was a typical RyanAir flight to Rzeszow.

Once we had our bags, we jumped on a bus and headed into town. At the train station, I pulled out my best Polish and bought two tickets. We had an hour to kill so we stuffed our faces with a Zapiekanka super. They went down well, then it was time to head towards Przemyszl. 90 minutes later, we arrived. Now the fun began. There were no signs, we tried to ask some people where to get a bus to Ukraine, and they stared straight through us. Fuckers !!! We walked to the otherside of the station, and saw some mini buses. A girl asked us in German if we were heading to Ukraine, and she pointed us in the direction of the buses. Once on, the trip was only twenty minutes, and then we were booted out at Grenica. We could see the border, so off we set. I do love land crossings, as they are all different. At this one, the line was huge with Ukis, but I spied a little gap that was for EU only, so up we went. Lucy went straight through, but I was held back. The border guard was a young girl, and she kept saying, Australian, Australian, and giving me the eye. I'm sure she wanted my other passport, but once I told her I was gay, she let me through !!! In no mans land, we were fenced off from the otherside. The Ukis on the otherside were hiding cigarettes that they were going to smuggle into Poland. Then we joined another queue. We were lined up for about ten minutes, when a Uki saw that we were from somewhere else and told us to push our way through, so we did, and five minutes later, we were in Ukraine.

First Impressions

Being a border town, the place is a shithole, but this is to be expected. We can't read a thing, in fact it all looks Greek to me, but it sounds Russiany. The people appear friendly and I have managed to exchange money, so now we are on another mini bus in the direction of L'viv

Post your own travel photos for friends and family Pictures

001 The Book	002 David Rzeszow	003 Lucy Eating a Zapiekanka Super	004 David Eating a Zapiekanka Super
005 Granny Eating a Zapiekanka Super	006 Ticket to Przemysl	007 Lucy Boarding the Train	008 David on the Train
009 Przemsyl Railway Station	010 Building in Przemsyl	011 Building in Przemsyl	012 Grenica Border Crossing
013 David on the Way to the Border	014 Lucy on the Way to the Border	015 David on the Way to the Border	016 David in Ukraine
017 Lucy in Ukraine	018 David Eating a Ukranian Ice Cream	019 Lucy Eating a Ukranian Ice Cream