I told you on my last post that I went to Crimea. So here's the pics. We took a taxi to Kyiv Borispol Airport on the evening of 16th June and had a nice leisurely journey to Simferopol. The airport is the smallest I've been to: domestic flights usually don't attract a lot of services at airports so Simferopol is obviously tiny. Terminal A at Borispol (domestic) is also a lot worse than Terminal B (international) with facilities: the 'departure lounge' is a bar, with some seats. Simferopol is similar, but a tiny bit larger. On arrival in the evening at Simferopol we needed to get to a flat that we'd arranged for one night. A dodgy guy gave us a lift for 100 UAH (for a 15 minute ride it's probably a bit steep, but I just went with it), and his mate joined us for some reason, so I spent the whole journey on the edge, as getting into a 'taxi' in Kyiv with two guys is a very bad idea. We got there okay, though, and arrived in a very dark alleyway where our flat was located. Charming.

I sadly didn't take any pictures of the flat, as we were only there for one night, but it was quite nice. Interestingly there was a frame for doing pull-ups, and two pictures on the wall: one of a semi-naked woman with a wolf (hand drawn), and another with a fully naked woman with a tattoo (CGI - my ladyfriend didn't think so but I insisted, upon closer inspection). After dumping our stuff, we walked out into the darkness to find a nice restaurant, and lo and behold, we found a charming Italian place called Caesar's or something. We sat outside in the warm night. Nice fountain in the middle of a courtyard. Lovely.

The following day, we got out early to begin our arduous journey to our next home in Alupka on the south coast. We took a bus to the avtovokzal (bus station) and from there took a bus to Yalta, the big city near Alupka. After two hours (it was not a completely direct route as the incredibly mountainous terrain in south Crimea means the roads go all over the place) we arrived in Yalta's avtovokzal. Tired, we still needed yet another bus to get to Alupka, so we got one, which took another 20-30 minutes. Fortunately (as I was dragging our shared suitcase, plus my backpack) the flat was very close to the bus stop at which we alighted.

The flat was close to central Alupka (it's a small village of around 8,000 people) and made our way inside. This picture shows what I saw as I collapsed on the sofa/bed watching a music channel on TV (there are a lot of Russian channels on their TV, more than in Kyiv, owing to Crimea's heavy Russian connection, which I'll talk about later). We watched that channel 90% of the time we were at home, as it was one channel we both understood fine. Music, international language - along with love, and football, of course.

You may be aware, from my previous posts, that most if not all Ukrainian towns have a statue of Lenin. Alupka goes one better: they have a gold one! Bling bling. Judging by a photo found on Google Earth, however, it was only recently made gold. Interesting.




In Alupka's somewhat large park, there is a little pond, and here it is.







Also in the park is an amazing selection of trees, a couple of which you see here. My ladyfriend took an abundance of pics of these trees. Notice the mountains in the background: Ai-Petri. We'll go there later.









This is what counts as a beach in Crimea: rocks. Not sand. Good points: it doesn't get your clothes etc covered in sand. Bad points: it hurts like hell to walk on. I'm not sure there's much to see in that wooden building either. It was a bit cold on the day I took this picture (17th June) but it'd soon warm up for the rest of the holiday.



Next day, 18th. Yesterday was a bit of a lazy day, after the long journey from Simferopol, so we decided to get a move on. We had 'breakfast' at a terrible self-service place in Alupka that wasn't even cheap. This cat didn't care: he was desperate for our food, especially the fish that my girlfriend had.




We were going to Simeiz, which required a short bus ride. To make things easier, we walked to the avtostantsia (I won't explain what that means) to catch a bus. This is a road to the bus station. That big black blob is my girlfriend. I'm not showing you.





Another shot of the road, showing the awful state of it. No surprise cars can't come this way.







And lo, we arrived in Simeiz. The view on exiting the bus was truly sublime, so I took this picture to illustrate. South Crimea is a place of real natural beauty, and none of my pictures can really capture that. Indeed, some of the best views have been from inside coaches driving along the coast.




Simeiz was a little bigger than Alupka, and I felt it was better, with more services and things to do. My girlfriend was particularly interested in this building as we made our way to the beach, showing foreign architecture (Turkish? Maybe).





This rock really stuck out just as we reached the beach. I think people were climbing it, and my girlfriend was disappointed that we couldn't do the same (too far).






You can see the same rock on the left of this shot, showing that the beach is a bit bigger and nicer than Alupka's. This is the view from a little restaurant that I liked and my girlfriend didn't. Hmm. I had a good play around in the sea, though, and then rented a sun lounger from a guy and thought lying in the sun for a while without sun cream would be fun. My skin is still peeling.



Walking back to the bus stop to head home, we encountered this sight: statues, trees, a path... "let's go this way instead". It was the beginning of a mini adventure.






Climbing up the road to which it led, the view got better and better, but we got further and further from Simeiz, which made me a little worried about how we'd ever get home.






This, in particular, was very nice.








After about two hours of walking from those statues, we finally got a bus to take us home. This is a shot taken shortly before that, as we were starting to lose hope of getting a bus.






So, we went home and had a good rest, and I could barely sleep with the burns I received. Still, we soldiered on the next day, 19th, and took a bus from the avtostantsia to Sevastopol, the other big city along with Simferopol. I must say it was a wonderful city, well worth a visit in summer. If you're a Russian speaker, it's a typical holiday resort. This is a memorial to soldiers who died in the Afghanistan War. Yeah, that one, in the 80s.


My girlfriend criticised my taking pictures of monuments I don't even understand. Nonsense, of course. This monument is, er...







And, um...








Okay, so maybe she has a point.








And no, I don't know who this guy is.








And frankly, I don't care what this is because it looks so damn cool. That's real Soviet architecture for you: solid angles.







Same statue, different view, with my girlfriend in front. Not that you'd know.







This square is HUGE and empty, with just people walking around with megaphones trying to get you to take a walking tour or something.






Same square, but there's a GATE. I know.








After a lovely meal in a lovely restaurant, my girlfriend decided on a spot of swimming. Having burnt my arse off the day before, I refused point blank to bare any skin, and was even ducking into shade at every opportunity. She decided to take a dive at this spot here, as everyone else was. Being in the harbour of Sevastopol, instead of exposed to the Black Sea like Alupka and Simeiz, meant that the water was completely calm. Good for a swim.


Another view of the water.








And again.








Not far from the water was a nice park with a fountain that more than one person wanted their picture next to. I took one with and without my girlfriend, and this is the one without.






There were many flowerbeds through this park, and so I wanted a nice pic illustrating that. Shame about the big black blob though.







Upon leaving Sevastopol we walked past this cinema. I don't know why, but it really appeals to me. It just looks so quaint and down-to-earth, a lot different to the big chains you find in England.






Terrible picture, but you can just about see the Russian flag there (more on that later).







Our trip back to Alupka allowed me to snap this pic of a mountain we drove past. Lovely.







Another day, another journey. The 20th was our chance to go to Yalta. Before that, however, we went to the place where the Yalta Conference (Stalin, Churchill, and the American bloke) took place: Livadia Palace. To get there, we, for some reason, caught a bus to Yalta, then got off in the middle of nowhere. We had to walk the rest of the way to Livadia. This pic is just for the lovely background.


Here's Livadia Palace itself. A fine place, but we decided not to go in. Maybe we should have, but we didn't.







Walking down a path from the Palace, to yet another beach. Bizarrely, to get to the beach we went through two lifts. Not ski lifts, but actual lifts, like in buildings. I've never used a lift to go down a hill.





Enough of that, the beach was crap. So we headed to Yalta on a bus from Livadia, and all was well. It's my old pal Lenin again, here near the sea front, where there was a ton of touristy stuff to see and do. This, like Sevastopol, is a real tourist hotspot, and I did enjoy it too.




I didn't take many pictures of Yalta - we got to the sea front at about 3.30pm and only had a few hours to enjoy ourselves - but here's a picture to show the ships and sea front. It's not very good, I know, but in case you haven't noticed, the centre of the photo's attention was not the sea front.




Upon leaving, I spotted another town centre building with Soviet stuff on it, so I just HAD to snap it. I have a thing for communism and Soviet stuff.






Sunday 21st was our final full day in Crimea, so we had a look around Alupka at the things we didn't see before. This is in one of the courtyards of the palace in Alupka. We, again, didn't go inside (my reasoning was that because it was designed by a Brit, it probably looks just like all the British houses I've seen in the UK).




Walking down one of the alleyways around the palace.








Indeed.








Enough of Alupka. We took a bus to the cable car stop near Alupka. Cable car? Yes, that's right: to the top of the mountain! It's a 5 minute ride up a 1234m mountain, easily the quickest way up, though not the quickest way down, of course. Here's the view inside the car. Scary.




What a view.








But it's even better from the top. Can you believe we were down there 10 minutes before? Crazy. Upon exiting the cable car, we were bombarded with people demanding we buy their tat or take photos with their eagle or play their shooting gallery (that guy was really keen).




We had a meal at the top, with views down below, and surprisingly it was actually very cheap, and pretty good. I was struck by this table-chair set, all lonely on the edge of the mountain. We missed the last cable car, so it took around 45 minutes to get down by car with some Crimean Tatar dudes. Now I know why it's worth paying for the cable car.



And that's your lot. It was a wonderful holiday with a wonderful lady. To celebrate on the final night, we drank mojitos - up to that point we'd been drinking cheap beer. Crimea is an interesting place: around two-thirds of the population is ethnically Russian, and it's an autonomous republic, but still part of Ukraine. Billboards from the Russian population of Crimea (political ads, of course) said things like "Russia, we believe in you!" and "Hello Russia! Get lost NATO!". Nowhere is the Russian feeling stronger than in Sevastopol, the home of a Russian navy fleet. Russian flags are everywhere, and there's even a museum of the Russian navy (we didn't go in). Simferopol, the capital, is interesting as the Crimean flag (white, with little red and blue horizontal stripes) is very frequently seen. Unlike in Kyiv, the Ukrainian flag is very rare in Crimea. The south coast has a lot less of any type of flags, possibly because of the abundance of Crimean Tatars who returned after Stalin sent them to far away places. I guess they don't like the Russians much. All in all, though, it's a very interesting 'island' (there's a little bit connecting it to Ukraine, but it's tiny) and the weather in summer is always lovely and sunny, without being humid. I'd definitely go there again - I haven't seen the east yet, and Sudak is apparently very nice. Anyway, this post took too long. I'll come back soon with details of my trips to Manchester and Liverpool!