Southern Ukraine: Odessa and Crimea

Arrived in Odessa on a hot sweaty old bus from Chisinau. Border crossing went fine though the bus driver made me redo my immigration card as he wanted it written in cyrillic, at which point the girl who was next to me kindly started raving about how stupid it was asking a british person to complete it in cyrillic. I told her it was OK as i could do it myself anyway but was nice of her. I was also asked what religion I was, which is a strange one. Never had that at a border crossing before.

At Odessa I stayed at "Black Seas BackPackers" and I will give it a big thumbs up, run by Ceri an Australian and only just opened, in fact it was not yet completely open and was allowed to stay for free as long as we passed the word on about their place, so here is my little bit of promotion.

The owner took us all that night to a night club on the beach with gymnastic, acrobatic and violinist shows before the stage turned instantly into a dance floor filled with beautiful Ukrainian women dancing the night away. Earlier I had caught up again with Kristina and Leah who I met in Romania and Moldova, I happened to see them at a bar across the road from the hostel, was nice to meet up again. Also with John the cyclist and loads of others from the hostel, was an interesting night. Odessa is a nice place to hang around, not so much to see specifically, but it has a relaxed atmosphere.



Left: Lovely Leah and Kristina who became my travel companions for some time in Ukriane.
Right: "Tavriya". As it says on the sign, our train from Odesa to Simferopol in Crimea.

After a couple of morning trying to organise my Russian visa, I get persuaded to head over to Crimea with Kristina and Leah - who I have now been spending a lot of time with - on an overnight train to Simferopol and down to Balaklava - is this where the article of clothing worn by robbers got its name ? - which is a suburb of Sevastopol near the sea.Visit some beaches and take a trip round the Crimean coast to Yalta.



Left: Kristina and Leah on our boat trip
Right: Me and our boat 'Margate'

Hightlight was the "Swallow's Nest" castle perched on the edge of a cliff, something I have seen photos of before and always wanted to see.. A really wonderful sight.



Left: "Swallow's Nest" castle off the Crimean coast.
Right: We have a few deserved beers on the way back.