Spring break in March

School holidays are done differently in the US system.  There is a very long break in the summer, three months.  Because of this there are not so many holidays during the rest of the school year. Other than Christmas when we had a little over two weeks the only other longer break was at the beginning of spring, hence referred to as - Spring Break.  We had a week's holiday.  It was so nice. Even in the Christmas holidays we had done some school preparation at times because we were at home; but in the spring we went away so it was the first time since August that we had seven consecutive days without any school work at all.

You can see foothills of the Carpathian mountains  in the background.  On the lake are two wild swans.  We walked past here most days and it was a lovely sight.

We spoke to a local resident one day as we were passing here and he remarked that it was good to see not one but two swans, that it wasn't good if there was only one.

We decided to go to the Carpathian Mountains region in the very west of Ukraine.  We went by train. There is a fast train service to the general area but it arrives in L'viv about 11.00 pm so we decided to go by the overnight train that arrives where we were staying at about 9.00 am, a much more civilized time for booking into your accommodation. We stayed just outside the town of Truskavets.  It is just at the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains and from the town you could see the mountains in the distance very beautiful.  In the winter people stay in Truskavets and travel to the snow fields.  Truskavets is a tourist town.  There is no industry there so the air is clean and fresh. In the seasons other than winter the main reason people travel there other than for the scenery and the quiet is for the waters.  There are many high rise apartment blocks which are spa resorts.  We also saw one quite large building where you could go and drink various waters.  We saw people with what looked like small tea pots.  In a large circular room there were taps and each had a different water.  People would fill up their teapot like containers and then drink the water via the spout. There were many of the containers for sale around the town and many were very elaborately painted with different scenes.  We watched but didn't participate.

Walking into Truskavets.  It took us about an hour each way.  Even though it was the beginning of spring it was still quite cold even when  walking fairly briskly.

We had walked a  hundred metres or so off the road into the forest. As you can see many of the trees still didn't have leaves.

The holiday resort we stayed at was about an hour’s walk outside the town and in the forest.  We could have caught a mini bus part of the way but whenever we went into the town we walked.  It was really nice walking through the forest.  The road we walked along for about half of the way was not used much so the walk was very pleasant. The forests here are quite different to the bush we are used to at home. The trees have more horizontal branches and many leaves so it is quite shady in the forest and the patchy shadows make beautiful patterns on the ground.  There is also very little undergrowth .  It almost looks as if someone mows it. Never having heard a woodpecker we didn't know the sound to listen for, but on one of our first days there we heard one in a park, in town and then knowing what to listen for we heard many of them on our walks.  It was special to hear them.  The leaves of the trees are so dense that you usually cannot see the birds you can hear. In the summer when we first arrived I really noticed the lack of bird sounds but in the spring you hear a lot and it is lovely.  In the parks in town we also saw many squirrels that are often  prepared to take nuts from people's hands. They are a different type of squirrel to this part of Ukraine.  The ones in the east were a chocolate brown with very feathery ears and tails. 

One of the cabins where we were staying. Each one had about a dozen rooms.

In Truskavets itself.  These are small booths aimed at tourists.  They are permanent structures but there were many small booths that were not permanent and we saw people packing up quite a bit of merchandise at the end of each day and then of course they had to set it all up again the next day.

We ate here almost every day. The food was Ukrainian and so cheap.

In Ukrainian the sign on this fire brigade station says:
to prevent, to save, to help.

This young lady slowed her horse down so it would be in the photo.  There were horse drawn carriages you could tour the town in . This was a government office of some kind but very typical of the older buildings in the town.

The last thing for this time is about our train journeys to and from Truskavets.  The fast train that I mentioned earlier takes about five hours to reach L'viv and then we would have had to travel south.  We decided to take the overnight train which went directly to our destination. Being new to Ukraine we didn't know what the train would be like. We had asked some people who had used the train and they just sort of said that we would find it an experience.  We did.  The train leaves Kyiv about 8.30 pm and we arrived about 9.00 am the next morning. We found out that we had booked on the least elaborate service.  The carriage was like a large open dormitory with double bunks on either side of a narrow aisle. Most bunks were across the width of the carriage but some ran the length of the carriage.  Ours were the length of the carriage ones. Not long after the train moved out Bill (tongue very much in cheek) asked when I was changing into my pyjamas.  Seeing as we were in a completely open carriage I was not changing.  However we soon found out that in Ukraine even if you are in an open dormitory carriage you do change into pyjamas.  There was a toilet at the end of the carriage but very small and everyone just changed where they were as modestly as they thought necessary.  Some people hung up blankets for family members, but most people just changed. Nobody seemed to even notice.  I do not know how men manage to sleep in the beds but Bill said he slept reasonably well.  The beds are very small.  The bed was about four centimetres wider than my shoulders and my feet touched the division to the next bed when I lay flat. People whose bunk ran the width of the train simply put their feet out into the aisle.  This was a hazard to avoid if you walked down the aisle after the lights went out (not of course that it was ever pitch dark).  I tend to spread out when I sleep but the bed was so narrow it was not possible so I didn't have the best sleep on the way there.  On the way back it was a little better. Most people was very thoughtful and considerate and kept their talking to a minimum.  People started going to bed about 9.30 pm and everyone quietened down.  The train of course stopped at many stations during the night and people got off and on.  We were on holidays so we could catch up on lost sleep and it was a most interesting experience especially when you look back on it after it is over.

Asked a passer-by in Truskavets to take a photo of both of us :)