Hello good people!
Danny and I are back from climbing Mt. Hoverla, and I thought I would give you all a run-down of our trip. If you were planning on doing something soon perhaps you should come back as this post will be a long one. So, grab some coffee (or preferably tea) and some snacks and read on.
Day 1: Danny and I packed up and left Izium at about 6:00 p.m. on the train to Kharkiev. I sat next to a rather large lady who kept taking the arm rest the whole time. Danny sat further away because, apparently, it doesn't matter what your ticket says, it's first-come first-served. Anyways, I did get to talk to a nice Jehovah's Witness guy who didn't seem to mind that the conversation was way outside of my language capabilities. We got to Kharkiev, and with a few hours to spare, we ran over to McDonald's and grabbed a bite. On this day, I was feeling incredibly sick with some sort of stomach flu so it was unpleasant.
We then hopped the overnight train to Kiev in which Danny and I had a Kype (a four person car) with two twin creepy girls who sat across from me and stared. I was so confused and very sleepy but I couldn't go to bed because the creepy girls were sitting on my bed. I expected them to say "Come play with us" at any minute. Well, in about a half hour we figured out that one of the girls didn't have a ticket and they were waiting to see if there was an extra bunk on the train (there wasn't). They paid the conductor, and she and her stick of a twin slept in the same bed while another dude had the other upper bunk. He played music all night and they kept getting up and down. It was hard to sleep. In the morning, more awkwardness ensued but we eventually got to Kiev. (Davidson, Megan, and Kim's bunkmate was my doppelganger, and she spoke a little English.)
Day 2: Once we arrived in Kiev (at about 8:00am) we headed over to Peace Corps office for a bit where I collected some books from the library, and Danny found some girl jeans that he's been wearing in the free bin. After that, we hung out with Megan while she showed her friend Kim around the city. We saw all of Kiev, I think, including the cathedrals, the friendship arch, Hydropark,Independance Square, etc. We had a train to catch at 10:00 or 11:00 p.m. but, before we hopped the train, we met up with Jason who used to be stationed in Izium before he got a job in Kiev, and had dinner.
We then caught our train and slept.
Day 3: We woke up and did our little train dance which means getting all your stuff together in a 7 ft by 9ft room with 4 people in it. (Difficult) Our bunk mates this time were much better. A very nice woman and a Communist Youth member.
This was our first day in Lviv so we took a Tramvae down to the center of the old city to book our hostel. We did and then went for a tour of the city. We hit most of the tourist spots including High Castle which was very high but, unfortunately, not a castle. It was, I thought at the time, the windiest place in Ukraine. It also has more steps than a packed AA meeting. By the time our tour of the city was over, we were beat but we didn't want to get dinner out AGAIN for those of us on a budget. We, instead, decided to go to this supermarket that our hostel guy recommended. It was 40 minutes outside of the city (by bus mind you- by car it's about 15 minutes), and named Ashan. It was HUGE! I've never seen anything like it in Ukraine. It was a combination Galleria Mall and Wal-Mart. It was very overwhelming to be in a place like that without being to a real supermarket in 6 months. I found BRIE there for gosh sake! It was crazy. We grabbed stuff for spaghetti at the hostel and headed back.
When we got back we cooked our dinner and then played Apples to Apples. Finally, we hit the hay in our 10 person room. I got a top bunk!
Day 4: Since our train didn't leave until 9:00 that night, we left our stuff in the hostel and went out for some breakfast (Nutella filled croissant.Yum!)
Danny and I were on our own so we visited the chocolate factory and then went to the souvenir bazaar where we met some other PCVs in town for the Hoverla trip. We joined them for lunch at this awesome gyro place. We then burned off those calories by going up the huge tower in the middle of the old city center.
Finally, we found our group again, went souvenir shopping again and then got dinner at the same gyro place before we had to travel back to the train station to meet up with our Hoverla group.
At the train station, I don't think I've ever seen so many PCVs. We stood in horrendous lines but we were successful in getting tickets back to Izium (we were worried a bit). Then as a huge, weird, English-speaking group, we boarded the train. It was a Platzkart which means there are little alcoves where 4 bunks are then 2 bunks along the aisles but the whole car is open. We bunked with Megan, Davidson, Heidi, and Kim. This was at 9:00 so we basically just got our stuff ready and then went to bed.
Day 5: We were woken up at 6:00 to get our stuff on and head out to catch the bus to the mountain. We hopped the buses and when we unloaded, began to walk. Thus began our 10 hour hike. We walked for about an hour on the road until we got to part where the actual trail begins. Nothing much to tell about the that except that I didn't bring enough water (M&Ms make you really thirsty, Jess). I was able to get some at the end of the road, though. Next was the wooded section which was gorgeous. Danny said it was the prettiest forest he'd ever seen. It was really beautiful but extremely dangerous (like me!;-)) There was ice every where and at one point Danny went sliding away and I thought he was going to go down into a ravine: a ravine with pointy rocks at the bottom. Luckily, he recovered though there was one girl who slipped and fell head-first into a tree. Her face was a bit bruised and cut from it but it looked like an awesome war wound.
Finally, we made it through the trees to the mountain. When we got there I thought, "There's no way". I mean, this mountain was at a forty-five degree angle (I'm not kidding). People walking up it looking like little ants. Regardless of my internal alarms we started up. There were so many of us, though, that we had to walk in a single file up the mountain, stopping every five minutes of so. It got worse as we went up. It got to the point where I was kicking snow steps into the side to get a hold. (Mind you this was in snow) I refused to look down and jumped anytime Danny touched me. I practiced the 'don't think about it' ritual. We finally got up there doing this.
At the top, you could see everything! It was beautiful and very windy but I was a bit concerned as to how we were to get down. No worries: back the way we came. Ok now I was much more nervous. I mean, this was so steep that I couldn't see the slope when I was standing 2 feet away from the edge. Then, I found out worse news. We were only at stage 2. There was a whole new peak. Our group decided to give it a go, so Danny and I headed out.
OK. I'm not going to lie. I was terrified. This was a slope that was pure snow, the wind was whipping at ridiculous speeds, and 20 meters away on either side were 2,000 foot drop offs. I crawled my way up. Unfortunately, or fortunately depending on your perspective, the weather was so bad that they closed the peak. So, Danny and I went as far as we possibly could (our group didn't follow us).
It was kinda nerve-wracking going back down to the main plateau because of the aforementioned wind and drop-offs but, surprisingly, making it up to the top killed all of my nerves. Danny and I slid back down and prepared to go down the mountain.
It turned out to be not too bad. You just had to tilt your body at a 45 degree angle and step foot over foot in order to stay up. If you fell you would side down a long ways (a couple people did and ended up terrified). However, once you were past the worst of it, you could kinda slide down on your own, so it was super fun. It was one of the scariest, most exhilarating, funnest, coolest experiences ever.
After that it was a quick 4 hours back to the vans and the train. We ate dinner (sandwiches), played Apples to Apples, and went to bed.
Day 6: We woke up in Lviv at 4:00 a.m. and had to get off the train. Megan and Kim's train for Kiev left at 8:00 so Danny and I just slept in the train station until then. Our train didn't leave until 1:00 a.m. so we had a lot of time to kill in Lviv so we went to the city center, got breakfast and walked around a bit. Then we decided to go back to Ashan to kill some time. They were having their birthday bash so we got to see clowns, mimes and a string quartet. We figured if worse came to worse we could go ice skating, bowling or see a movie but we ended up just walking around until Danny got all T-Rex arms and uncomfortable.
We finally made it back to the train station and had to wait a couple of hours for the train. When it got there, we got in and fell asleep immediately.
Day 7: Our train ride from Lviv was 24 hours so we had a bit of time on the train. We woke up at around noon. Luckily, our walking all around Lviv the day before killed all of our soreness. We watched a movie, read, drew, etc. We were also lucky enough to not get a bunk mate so it was just Danny, Davidson, and me.
FINALLY, we got to Izium at 1:00am, took a taxi home, and fell into our own bed.
So ends the saga of our epic journey to Mt. Hoverla in Western Ukraine. If you've read all the way up until this part I congratulate you. It was 7 days of trains, sightseeing, and walking. It was incredibly fun, but incredibly tiring at the same time. Anyway, the trip came full circle because I caught a chest cold from somebody. I'm feeling much better today though. Ok, you've read enough, so go do something productive instead of reading a silly blog. Jeez.
Miss you all, love you all, and glad I didn't die on the mountain.
