Fur Coat No Knickers

SIMEFEROPOL: As I write this I'm in the Ukraine and I've paid for hours of internet though if my travelling companions grow tired of my blogging I'll have to love you and leave you. This evening is our fifth night in the country so far after spending two in Chernivitsi, one in an overnight train from there to Odesa, had the day walking around, and then caught another overnight train down here. We were only supposed to be here for two nights - it's a bit of a shithole but good for daytrips - but the block we were renting the room from left us playing cards and drinking coffee for three hours so we had to postpone one of our daytrips. The city itself isn't much to look at, it's basically a working town that serves as a transport hub for the more popular coastal destinations, but we're having fun anyway. We've eaten Uzbek food and wandered through some underground markets.

Yesterday we were in Odesa for about ten hours. Enough time to find some fantastic bars, visit the famous Potemkin steps (from the movie), a small museum in a hotel where Isadora Duncan, Mark Twain and others stayed, look out onto the Black Sea and observe some Yankee blokes shopping for Ukrainian brides.

The previous day we kicked around Chernivitsi and visited an enormous, sprawling local market that retailed everything from biscuits to televisions, and just about everything in between. Then we lazed around the hostel until we got on the train. The previous evening I went out and got shitfaced with the hostel owners then saved one of them from being beaten up by his hulking Ukrainian neighbour. (Kind words, not fists, I can assure you.)

During the day we visited Kamyanets-Podilsky, a town famous for the huge gorge (about fifty metres deep, fifty metres wide) that enclosed the old town. From atop the gorge you can see a small river that snakes through it as well as rope bridges and even a waterfall. We checked out a couple of churches there (including one where the Christian victors had erected a statue of Mary atop a minaret built by the vanquished Ottomans), ate lunch and visited the big ticket item: a large castle built on the other side of the gorge.

Not the most impresive castle I've ever been to, however it was very hands on so we spent a couple of hours dodging the mud, climbing the ramparts, and even firing a crossbow. Then we walked back through the appropriately named Tank Park (it features a tank) and watched the thousands of birds that swarm black in the dusky sky like bats.

And that's what we've been doing so far in the Ukraine. Tomorrow we visit Suday, a fortress on the Silk Route, as well as the bay of Novy Svit, the day after it's a small cave city and then on to Yalta where I hope to guarantee a postwar peace.