Europe Trip to Ukraine

http://www.cracktwo.com/2011/04/25-abandoned-soviet-monuments-that-look.html

http://www.archdaily.com/101626/forgotten-monuments-from-the-communist-era-in-bulgaria

visted there for 2 weeks about 7 years ago to hang out with a college buddy who was from ukraine. im from wisconsin, similar climate as where your from. if your going over summer, beware. its FUCKING hot there. like, youll be drenched in sweat within minutes after leaving the house (assuming its air conditioned, otherwise your already drenched). spent first week in kiev. lots of stray dogs. i remember my buddy telling me to not mention to anyone that im american. said people may see that as an opportunity to rob me. bring sunglasses. lots of good looking women over there. against popular belief of westerners, vodka is not their most popular beverage. mostly beer, which we were drinking in public often. they have mcdonalds over there and shit, but they dont put ice in the cups. do NOT drink water from faucets and shit. there plumbing is original from CCCP days, much like everything there like roads, subways, etc. a bottle of water in the city was like 4 or 5 USD. a pack of smokes was about 1 dollar. riding the subway cost like 1 cent US.

>>1187173

Happy to hang out with you guys if this happens on january-february next year

Peace

>>1187173
There are day trips from Kiev to Chernobyl/Pripyat everty day, I think they cost around 80 dollars for the day? It's a shame because the original reactor has now been covered so you will miss seeing that one. Pripyat was interesting for me personally to see the effects of nature taking over after people leave, but a lot of the stuff around the town has been kind of set up intentionally to create a 'spookier' kind of feeling, gas masks hanging from the rood of the school classrooms and half burnt fluffy toys in the kindergarten etc etc. I would suggest a trip out to the west of Ukraine if you can, get to Ivano Frankivsk by overnight train and head towards the Carpathians, do some horseback riding or hiking- whatever your budget allows, Kiev is definitely cheapest to fly to and to start with and is a cool city but keep your wits about you. I didn't go to the East for obvious reasons. It's a hell of a place so it is, just go with the flow and enjoy the insanity of it all.

>>1187189
Sorry for the terrible typing.

File: map-with-travel-times2.png (318KB, 643x504px) Image search: [Google]

318KB, 643x504px

budget? length of duration?

big thing about ukraine is you don't want to be a visible backpacker like in western europe, actually wear long sleeve pants and shirt and have a single suitcase, instead of jean shorts, flip flops and 60L bag

if you're trying to make the most of your money and don't have anything in mind should probably stick to eastern europe.

usually it's cheaper flying round trip from just two airports, if you've flying into kiev than leave that way

could do a loop of kiev-odessa-bucharest-belgrade-krakow-lviv-kiev if you have the money, and want to do the europe train meme

don't need a year to knowledge prep, unless you're going to fluently learn another language, best time for Ukraine is probably spring or fall if you're backpacking

>>1187176
this is some good advice, don't know if water is that pricey

>>1187175
>>1187176
>>1187189
>>1187219
Wow thanks a lot guys! I know a little bit of Russian, and am continuing to learn it. Length of duration is not an issue. We do not have a set budget yet, as we wanted to decide on the entire trip first, hence the long prep time. That, and we are in the home stretch of finishing school, which will be towards the end of next year. The budget will pretty much be determined by who has the least amount of money to spend haha, as unfortunate as it is for the rest of us. Anyway, thanks again!

>>1187182
That sounds like a great idea, but that is too soon before we would be leaving, sorry.

have the rest of the people been to europe yet?

if yes, then i would do 'hardmode', eg. zagreb-sarajevo-craiova-bucharest-chisinau-kyev-lvov-warsaw-krakow-banska bystrica-budapest-vienna or so.

if not, then just fly into one of the western big cities like london/paris/amsterdam, leave europe from another. if you buy it as "multi-destination" in the same booking, the ticket will be much cheaper. and then from london or dortmund or eindhoven or wherever you can fly wizz for dirt cheap to kiev.

what else... work on your ukranian pronunciation, if you can say hi and thanks, it saves you a lot of money. also practice your best idgaf/depresssed face, smiling non-stop, something americans don't notice they're doing, it makes you a target for all sorts of scams.
also prepare your liver.

have fun