Today we awoke in a great hotel in Kamanets-Podelski (don't confuse it with Mogilev-Podelski, the place of our Grandmother's birth, where we stayed for two days in a dreadful hotel.) Kamanets-Podelski is a wonderfully picturesque town of over 100,000 people and was founded in the year 1002. The following are pictures of the town including the castle which is a big tourist attraction. This is a popular tourist spot for Ukranians. The only English I heard spoken was by Ukranians who learned in school. The hotel personnel all speak English to some degree and the menus at our hotel were in Russian and English. Here are some photos of this very interesting town and our hotel and our amazing Guide Alex, translator in a multitude of languages and dialects, driver, and Mitsubishi Outlander all wheel drive vehicle. The roads in Ukraine are pretty bad. Nobody I know would regularly drive on them. The drivers are very courteous and attentive to their driving and not distracted. Cars will move over promptly to let you pass on narrow roads and the concept of "road rage" is unknown here. Please note the bridge railing with all the padlocks left by couples, with names painted or engraved on them. Alex said he saw the same thing in Odessa, Ukraine.
We began our road trip back to Lviv (where, regrettably, we will stay only one night, and leave for London just after noon tomorrow. The following photos show some churches. There are churches everywhere is Ukraine. Even in small villages there will be a very ornate church. Also shown are some pictures from a stop for gas. Note the man cleaning the windshield in the uniform that matches the colors of the station. That is available to all, not like the "full service" at additional price in America. Also note the availability of American junk food. I haven't the slightest idea while the name "Pringles" had to be changed to "Pringoooals" for the Ukraine market. While not pictured, you can buy hard liquor as well as beer and wine at every gas station convenience store. If you can't make out the gas prices on the sign, its about 22 grvenias per liter or about $4 per US gallon. In Poland it was $6 per US gallon. The picture of the fellow driving down the highway on a wagon being pulled by a garden tiller is not at all unusual in Ukraine. You see them all the time outside of the cities, sometimes pulling bales of hay or a wagon with a whole family in it. If you can't afford a family car or a real tractor, this seems to work well. They have no license plates and the police don't bother them and its just a fact of some people's existence in Ukraine.
We arrived back in Lviv and checked in at The Swiss Hotel which is wonderful. I never stayed in a hotel where there was a rose in the vase of the all marble bathroom.
Phyllis and I took a walk around the downtown area and went to dinner at a place we ate at when we were here a few days ago. A sort of a cellar dining room with wonderful Eastern European food and Ukranian wine. Photos include the Lviv Opera House, the ever-present McDonalds (there was a McDonalds in Israel at the visitors center at the foot of the Fortress at Masada in the Judean Desert too), and a Lviv police car. I never saw a full size police car in Poland or Ukraine, of course you may only need to catch up to the guy being pulled by the garden tiller, so a small car is fine.
It's going to take awhile for me to articulate all my impressions and learning experiences on this trip, but I'll relate what I have before I end this blog after arriving home on the 24th.
We've been traveling for three weeks and it's all been great.
Vic
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