I'm sat in an internet centre writing this. The computer is, I think, diesel powered, because every so often I have to crank it up with a winding handle. To go from one page to another, you click, then go off for a brew and come back ten minutes later to find it still loading... The space bar hardly works and I keep hitting the key by mistake that turns the Roman letters into Cyrillic ones... Apart from that, Ukraine is so much nicer than Russia. People are friendly, they smile, they don't blank you when you ask a question and they are genuinely helpful if you ask them something.
My first stop was Simferopol, gateway to the Crimea. A bustling town with a river that runs through the middle, lined with willows and other trees and with an abundance of bird and animal life. They have real squirrels here, red ones, not those north American tree rats... It was so pleasant to amble along by the river, watching plastic bags or empty beer bottles make their way down through the town, getting stuck occasionally on a pile of newspapers or an old tyre, lobbed in by local kids to give the water a bit of variety. The temperature has also gone up here, reaching 30 degrees for the last week, not the kind of heat you want to wander around in and a far cry from a month ago when the warmest place was by the eternal flame at the tomb of the unknown soldier. By gauging the time of day and planning my route I was able to get into and out of town by clever use of the shady river bank, and along streets where the houses cast a shadow. There is a mosque in Simferopol, which dates back to 1502, but it was closed. The Holy Trinity Cathedral wasn't and is a fantastic building, inside and out. Huge religious mosaics cover the outside, under blue and gold domes, and inside the iconostasis and walls are covered by hundreds of paintings, each in a gold frame and which brightened the shady interior. Outside, a priest was blessing a tank of holy water, surrounded by old ladies all wearing worn coloured cardigans and crossing themselves elaborately in the Orthodox way.
From Simferopol I took an express bus to Yalta. It was here that I realised I am not quite the transport nerd I thought I was. The world's longest - and at two and a half hours for the 80km / 50 mile journey, probably the slowest - trolleybus route starts in Simferopol and goes across the hills to Yalta. Having spent five minutes sat on a trolley in other towns, I decided the bus would be better. Even though everyone had brought their bags on - to avoid paying the extra thrippence ha'penny to stow them in the lockers - and had left them in the aisle; even when it overtook a cement lorry on a blind bend and then steamed past two other trolleybuses when there was a van coming the other way. The one problem I do have with transport in this part of the world - death wish drivers aside - is that no-one looks out of the window, and therefore they always close the curtains against the sun. Add to this the tree-lined road and my ability to see much of the trek over the pass was limited. Just occasional glimpses of vines, newly green, and of hills lined with scrubby bushes, a rock fall, or goats. I have also learnt a valuable lesson with regard to seats on these buses: if a seat is empty, it's probably broken.
Yalta is a very pretty place. It sits on a bay surrounded by hills and there are several beaches and a long prom on which to stroll. On the top of a small hill is a pseudo-Greek temple, accessible by a chairlift that clanks over the rooves of the houses below, dropping bits of rust and defying any kind of safety regulations. I must try it. How injured can I get falling from a rusty metal bucket thirty feet in the air? Every bench on the prom has its own resident cat, who cough up fur balls next to people eating ice-cream and leave piles of hair everywhere. I nearly stood on one very dirty once-white cat that was licking its love spuds in the gutter, only noticing it when it tried to claw my leg. Apart from the obvious threat of rabies, I am enjoying Yalta and have decided to live it up a little here, and went for a hotel rather than taking a chance and staying in someone's house. To this end, I have taken a suite of rooms at the Hotel Krim (and no, I hadn't noticed that rhymes with 'grim') and have filled the fridge with produce from the local market and Ukrainian beer and have stuffed my face royally. I spend my days strolling along the prom and that's where I am going now, even if it is a bit foggy...
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