Most Excellent Kiev
Theres been a period of adjustment. Adjustment to highschool Hitler hostel operators, collapsing bunk beds stolen from orphanages and district wide hot water outages but once housetrained to the quirks that make up Kiev hostel life one realises just how charming the place is.
Colleen arrived the day after her us and picking her up from Borisypol Airport was Mission Number One (actually, getting ourselves to the hostel from Borisypol was really mission one). Mission number two involved getting a street directory and some decent food. The food was easy. We found an excellent buffet near Independance Square. The Street Directory took a further 24 hours and lead us around a good chunk of the elevated part of the city centre then down to the river.
A posse of seven of us visited an Italian restraunt that would have been *well* outside my price range had it been at home, then we drank warm beers and gin on the steps of the Golden Gate stumbled back to the hostel, and continued outside on the steps, joined by the other occupants till 4am. It seems neither drinking in the street nor firetwirling poi are illegal.
Yesterday afternoon we met up with solncasvet and a crew of around 15 explorers from Industrial Kiev. We went to an abandoned trolley before being chased out by the owner and his dog. A 20 minute bus ride saw us outside a supermarket where premium Vodka goes for $3 a bottle. We bought supplies then scaled the to the roof of a building whos construction had started just prior to the fall of the Soviet regime, thus leaving it incomplete burierd in foliage and hulking in its minimalistically functional concrete state.
We had a most excellent picnic, cooking sausages on sticks n swilling grog. It was awesome meeting so many fine Ukrainian explorers, swapping tales and asking questions.
At around 11pm we took the long bus ride back to the edge of the Metros reach, parting ways and heading into the 150 metre deep bowels of the Kiev Metro, which has to the the grandest, most elegant underground railroad i have ever seen.
Colleen arrived the day after her us and picking her up from Borisypol Airport was Mission Number One (actually, getting ourselves to the hostel from Borisypol was really mission one). Mission number two involved getting a street directory and some decent food. The food was easy. We found an excellent buffet near Independance Square. The Street Directory took a further 24 hours and lead us around a good chunk of the elevated part of the city centre then down to the river.
A posse of seven of us visited an Italian restraunt that would have been *well* outside my price range had it been at home, then we drank warm beers and gin on the steps of the Golden Gate stumbled back to the hostel, and continued outside on the steps, joined by the other occupants till 4am. It seems neither drinking in the street nor firetwirling poi are illegal.
Yesterday afternoon we met up with solncasvet and a crew of around 15 explorers from Industrial Kiev. We went to an abandoned trolley before being chased out by the owner and his dog. A 20 minute bus ride saw us outside a supermarket where premium Vodka goes for $3 a bottle. We bought supplies then scaled the to the roof of a building whos construction had started just prior to the fall of the Soviet regime, thus leaving it incomplete burierd in foliage and hulking in its minimalistically functional concrete state.
We had a most excellent picnic, cooking sausages on sticks n swilling grog. It was awesome meeting so many fine Ukrainian explorers, swapping tales and asking questions.
At around 11pm we took the long bus ride back to the edge of the Metros reach, parting ways and heading into the 150 metre deep bowels of the Kiev Metro, which has to the the grandest, most elegant underground railroad i have ever seen.