Today we feature a guest post of Agnes Jimenez. Enjoy!
We were inspired to take a trip into Ukraine by a friend of ours who spent a very happy week in Kiev during the European Football Championships of 2012. And realising we were technically only a few hours away in our Krakow base, we figured we’d take a break from Poland and off we went to see how they did things further East.
Don’t ask where the random inspiration came from, but we decided to check out Wadowice on the way – even though it isn’t on the way – which is where the late Pope John Paul II came was from.
A seriously pretty town with a gorgeous square – also quite funny as you’ll see at least a hundred stalls all selling Polish Papal Cream Cake. Apparently JP II once said he liked the stuff and that was it – they declared it his favorite food on Earth and started coining in on it! Don’t get me wrong it’s pretty gorgeous stuff, but it’s everywhere to the point of insanity.
The first surprise of the trip came shortly after we’d gotten back on track only to find that the A4 motorway that’s supposed to take you right to the border for the most part hadn’t been built yet. As such, the only way to get to our first stop of Przemysl was to take the scenic route. This transformed the journey we’d expected to take about three hours into closer to five and a half.
Over in Przemysl, there’s not a massive amount to see but to be honest there doesn’t have to be – it’s just a very pretty village with a scattering of gorgeous churches and a ski run. It wasn’t operational in the summer, but the alpine sledge toboggan type thing was and of course, we had to give it a go…always a hoot!
We hit the border with Ukraine at Medyka and that’s where the fun really started. I was already told before leaving that it would all go smoother for anyone willing to slip a bribe over to the police on the border, but I refuse to do such things unless there’s a gun pointed at my head. So the merriment began – “Pull the same face as the one on your passport” followed by “Stand perfectly still and stare into my eyes” followed by any number of inane questions that achieve nothing but to hold you up for two hours. We got through eventually – assumedly when they realised we weren’t going to pay up – and it was onto Lviv.
Be warned; the roads to the city are deceptive. It’s all very smooth and controlled, but as soon as you hit Lviv you’re talking the kinds of potholes and humps in the road that can literally beach your car. Literally – get it wrong and you’ll kill your car, right in the middle of the city center roads. And as for rules, regulations and signals, forget about them all – just keep cool and drive like they’re all out to kill you.
Lviv is a stunning city that’s very similar to Krakow, which isn’t surprising as it did once belong to Poland…a sore conversation point I would go on to find.
From thereon in though it was smooth sailing – beautiful buildings, nice people and cheap prices. In fact, the only thing to complain about was that we ended up missing half the show we’d booked to see at the theatre
…nobody told us that Ukraine is in a different timezone – GMT+2.
By Lisa Morton
This blog post was brought to you by Lisa Morton on behalf of Theholidayplace.co.uk. Click here to find out more about The Holiday Place’s exclusive range of Antigua holidays and much more.
