Ukraine 2010 trip report - Relaxing in the Carpathians

Sunset above the Carpathian forest

If there's one thing in common for every day we spent in the Carpathians this summer, that's rain. I think we didn't have a single day without rain in ten days. Luckily we had a few better days when it didn't rain constantly and we had a tv in our room so it helped at least a bit. Everything on Ukrainian tv is dubbed though so it helped Inna a lot more than me. Initially we had plans to stay a week in the room and go hiking with our tent after that but with the almost constant rain those plans changed.

During the second day we realized the only bad thing in our room: the location. The nearest shop wasn't really that close and the restaurant nearby looked a bit too expensive for our taste. If I don't remember wrong the walk to the shop took about 40 minutes. There was pretty much only one road in the small village, making the village quite long and very narrow. The shops were ok, but there was hardly any fresh meat available.

Grassy ski slopes

We spent the first days hiding from the rain in our room and whenever it didn't rain we walked somewhere nearby, searching for something worth seeing. After two or three days the weather seemed to be better and we decided to visit Bukovel, the biggest ski center in Ukraine. Naturally there wasn't any snow there in the middle of the summer but it was interesting to see the village nevertheless. Everything there seemed to absorb its energy from winter and snow. It felt somehow strange to walk there in the village and imagine how everything will change when the snow falls. Even during the summer one of the ski lifts works and takes people up to the small mountain for a fee. We took the lift too and it was worth it: the mountain was too small to offer any real hiking challenge but big enough for great views of the surroundings. The ski lift was quite slow and higher than I had thought. I started wondering how often they check if the CCCP-era lift is actually strong enough to hold people.

On the top it was surprisingly cold and I was wearing my cap and gloves - in the middle of the summer. The sceneries from the top were beautiful and everything around was green. Some cows were there with us but it seemed like they only cared about the grass, not about the sceneries. From the top we were lucky enough to spot Hoverla, the highest mountain in Ukraine, and another slightly smaller mountain next to it. We were also checking the mountains on the other side as we had plans to climb them in a few days. Before taking the bus back to our cottage we ate pizza in a relatively fancy restaurant. The only reason we went there was their good offer for two pizzas. That's also the reason why I ate a pizza with mushrooms.

Posing on top of the hill

Hoverla is on the left with its summit (2060 m) covered in clouds.

The hanging bridge

The waterfall

Before hiking we wanted to see a waterfall not too far from the place where we were staying. The road to the waterfall leads not only to the waterfall but also to a cottage of the president of Ukraine. Not so surprisingly the road had brand new asphalt and mirrors almost in every curve (you never see either in Ukraine). The map we were using seemed to be older than this road since according to the map we were supposed to walk along some kind of footpath. On the way we saw a big hanging bridge and relaxed there for a while before continuing the 6-kilometer walk. After an hour and a half we found the waterfall and it wasn't even as crowded as we had feared. The falling water created a strongish wet wind on the bottom of the fall and again it was surprisingly cold there. We also decided to climb on top of the waterfall but you couldn't see much from there since everything was covered in trees and small bushes up there. On the way back Inna stepped in a bit too deep in the water and her shoe got completely soaked. It's good that we had that radiator in our room!

After getting back to some kind of civilization we wanted to visit some shops in Jaremtsa, a small town nearby. We bought some food for hiking and searched for a waterproof jacket and trousers for Inna. We found a couple of nice jackets and came back the next day to buy them. One for Inna and one for me. The next day was supposed to be the starting day for our three-day hiking trip. It was raining heavily in the morning and Inna didn't feel like going at all so we decided to stay in our room.

A railway station. Yes, it worked. Note the Quake 3 logo.