A selection of beds, & Lviv's underground world

Ah, wonderful Lviv (city of coffee & chocolate) and western Ukraine.  It's worthy of a book, not a blog post - so my goal here is to give you a teaser, an inspiration to visit this amazing city & region.

I impressed my Ukrainian friends by booking my train tickets online (it's new!) and had a good night out in Kiev while I awaited my overnight journey (thanks, Genia! and nice to meet your friends and also Pedro!).
Train journey was comfortable but uneventful - I think the elderly lady in the bunk below me was quite astonished to be sharing a kupe (compartment) with an English lass!

Arrived in Lviv just after the sun came up, but luckily the hostel was having a quiet weekend so they had invited me to check in as soon as I arrived in town.  Anton & his friend Andrew welcomed me warmly (with delicious coffee & cheese toasties) and I moved into a big empty room...where I would remain the only hosteller for the duration of my stay.  Not to say that the room was always empty, but more on that later...

We said good-bye to some departing guests from Poland, and while Andrew (a guide) was filling my head with suggested itineraries & sights to see, two new guests appeared - Sammi & Asami, from China & Japan respectively, who have been working in Dnipropetrovska and had spent 17 hours on a train to visit Lviv for just 1.5 days.  This was perfect for me as the girls had a long list of things to see & do, so I just tagged along as their Cyrillic sign interpretor.  See the photo album for the MANY things we did in just one day!  The highlight was climbing the 65 m tower in the town hall to admire the amazing view of Lviv's UNESCO-protected town square, and zillions of churches!  And also, entering the Armenian church just as the Sunday congregation began singing...too beautiful to describe in words.

private dining room, Ukrainian style
- with Sammi & Asami

We learned the advantage of travelling in the off-season when we had a private dining room in the restaurant we chose for dinner.  Rolled chicken (cannot be described in any other way) and a delicious egg & cheese torpedo plus a bottle of Georgian wine between us - a great way to finish the day.

Of course, the day wasn't remotely finished as we returned to the hostel to find a brace of singer-songwriters jamming in our kitchen - apparently we had landed in the heart of folk/rock music for Lviv and the wider world - fabulous!

The next day I set out to explore the huge & amazing Lychakiv Cemetery.  Again, see the album for photos - frankly I couldn't hope to capture the scale and detail of this place, but I have done my best.  I particularly loved the organic designs on many of the headstones, and the inclusion of photos or reliefs - in one case, a larger-than-life-sized statue of a very fit man, perhaps he was overcome by his own vanity?  The Ukrainian and Polish war memorials were sobering, especially as they are side-by-side, reminding one of how closely connected this region is to Poland.

Lviv = lion.  He's everywhere!

Then it was on to the Beer Museum, which actually contained a lot of interesting information about the history of beer worldwide & in Lviv - as well as some tasty samples, of course!

The next day I thought I'd have an adventure across the Carpathian Mountains.  At Anton's recommendation, I took a 4.5 hour train ride to Mukacheve.  That might not sound too appealing but it was one of the loveliest train routes I've ever been on- passing through isolated mountain villages where people still travel by horse & sled,  with the sun shining brightly on the clean white snow....

Mukacheve itself was a good challenge, as it's near a lot of borders and the language is some kind of Hungarian/Ukrainian hybrid.  No matter, I had a great time toodling around on the marshrutka buses while I tried to find my way to the zamok (castle) - finally made it!

Bogrash - much more delicious
than the name implies

I then found my way back into town, where I visited the rynok (market) - a lovely woman insisted that I try all her pickled vegetables, and kept placing tasty samples on the back of my hand.  I came away with a big bag of pickled carrots for a bargain price.

I enjoyed my stroll around this pedestrianised town where I recognised the influences from Hungary (paprika featured prominently in the rynok & the kafe), Slovakia (a classic wooden church built with no nails!), and Romania (really crazy wedding dress shops  ;-)  ).  It was a beautiful sunny day and a great place to spend it!  Also it was nice to get off the "tourist track" and have to work hard to communicate with local people & find my way.

I returned to the hostel at about 22.30, just in time to catch the end of a small concert from a Belarusian folk singer (which took place next to my bed!!!).  His name is Alexei Nezhevets. You can check out his music here!

On my final day in Lviv, I met up with an old colleague, Oksana (who actually lives in Kiev but was in Lviv for an event).  We went to the Gasova Lampa (Gas Lamp) restaurant, which has a funny entrance & exit system involving a spiral staircase and traffic lights.....here's a little history on the place.

Taras Shevchenko

 I walked around for a while taking photos of the many, many statues that are dotted all over the city.  One of my favourites was a a giant man with a book, with a book market neatly tucked in his shadow!

Tsukernia kafe - the selection!

Then I took myself out for cake & "Wiener coffee" at an absolutely delicious kafe which definitely showed the Austro-Hungarian influences in this city!

Oksana and I went to the Opera House for an operetta - THE thing to do in Lviv, it was packed!  It was much more "cute" and accessible than the (few) operas that I've seen- particularly when they made a special change in honour of International Women's Day, by replacing the usual chorus line with a dance by all the male stars of the show!

Welcome to the Opera House kafe

After the show we went to the kafe/restaurant of the Opera House - a great story in itself.  When the Opera House was built, it was constructed over the old river.  From a building perspective, obviously a bad idea, and before long it began to sink.  Apparently the architect was so devestated that he commited suicide.

Luckily for us, it stopped sinking and now the cafe sits on the underground river.  They've taken advantage of the history by making an underwater theme and deliberately crooked walls.  There is also a sneaky secret passage between the restaurant and the main opera house.


Finally (& a bit sadly), it was time to catch my overnight train to Kiev.  I had a lucky surprise to find that I was all alone in my kupe - I am definitely crediting this to my online ticket purchase, as I had the opportunity to choose my own bed while seeing all that were available - but I didn't imagine that the kupe which was empty 2 weeks ago would still be empty when we actually travelled!

I end this blog post with another massive recommendation for Lviv & western Ukraine.  Finally, a chance to learn some Ukrainian (most of Kiev speaks Russian as their primary language) and to enjoy some truly delicious coffee, cake and company!  And by the time you get there, you might be able to explore Anton's amazing cave.....