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Today is our last day in Crimea. Overall we spent more than a week and went to several places around Alupka, the town we stay at. The place we went the most times to is Vorontsovsky Palace and park around it which is just 10 minutes by foot from our house. We would usually stroll around the park enjoying the views. On one of the days we took a tour of the palace (40 grivnas per person) but it turned out a complete waste of time and money. It took the guide about 30 minutes to walk us through all the rooms and spit out enormous amount of dry facts about the place none of which we remembered by the time the tour was over.

The one fact about the palace that I did memorize is that it literally has two faces. The Northern side is built in western style while the Southern side (pictured above) carries distinct Eastern elements like “There is no Conqueror, except Allah.” engraved above the entrance. This fact symbolizes multicultural nature of Russian Empire of 19th century.
Continue reading ‘A week in Crimea, Ukraine – Part 2’

This will be the last post from my Ukraine series. Overall I spent in Ukraine around 5 weeks and visited 4 cities. The last place we went to was Zaparozhye, a city with population of around 1 million people stretching for several miles along Dniepr - the longest river in Ukraine. During our visit we stayed at my cousin who lives and works in the city.

Zaporozhye is famous for its power plant - DneproGES. It is a huge dam connecting two parts of the city and supplying electricity to the numerous plants nesting along the river bank. It was built in 1932 and is the largest hydroelectric power plant in Ukraine.

We took a walk across it and I should say it was quite a nervous adventure. The bridge above the dam swings with each passing truck and you literally have to hold the railings to be able to stay straight.

Somewhere in the middle my cousin commented that the bridge is long overdue for repairs and then I really regretted I allowed him to get me out over there. I truly felt relieved when we were finally over on the other side. By the way, the dam was named after Lenin and still holds that title (you can read it on the sign, in Russian of course).

The entertainment industry in Zaporozhye is not nearly as developed as in Kiev. There is just one bowling club in the city. ;-) We did find what to do however.

We went to the historical museum which is located on the Khortisa island just down the river from the dam. There is a popular belief that in the XIV-XV centuries Khortitsa served as a camp for kozaks, free people who fled from landlords and made a military camp on the island. The museum guide however rebuffed the idea and claimed that archaeological surveys prove that there has never been a camp on the island itself, although there were quite a few kozak camps in other places along the river.

In 18th century Russian queen Ekaterina II abolished kozaks military organization - the Sitch. Part of the kozaks who fled Russian troops settled on the banks of Dnepr river founding the city of Zaporozhye.

Today the city government with support from private businesses is building a reduced size model of a camp on the island which among other things will have VIP accommodations for important guests. Part of the financing comes from entertainment industry. I was told they use the camp to film some scenes from a future movie about Ukrainian kozaks.

Now this is a bonus shot from the city of Zaporozhye. I captured the scene close to my cousin’s apartment. This may mean nothing to you but the image does revive some memories from my childhood. The lady by the wall (click on the image to enlarge) collects empty bottles for recycling. My dad not once used to send me to such a place to exchange for money the empty bottles we collected over the week. I didn’t mind much since the profit was usually all mine to keep. ;-)

As I already mentioned, this will be the last post from my Ukraine series however I will be happy to answer any of your questions in the comments. Ukraine is an interesting country which offers genuine history and amazing traditions. I hope this series of posts conveys this idea despite some dark bits here and there.