ukraine: vorokhta and the carpathian mountains

I've lived in Ukraine for six years, and somehow this is the first time I visited the Carpathian mountains. I have no idea why it took me so long.

Getting to this area was relatively easy, though time consuming. It started with a night train from Kyiv to Ivano-Frankivsk. I got lucky and was on a new train, which was pretty spiffy. As I was in a second class car (called coupe in Ukrainian,) my bed was quite long and comfortable.

The train arrived at 0740 in Ivano-Frankivsk, the train station there isn't nearly as grand as some of the stations I've seen around the country. Still, it is nice.

Since I had just short of two hours until my next train left, I went for a walk. I've been to Ivano-Frankivsk once before, for just a day. Just out of curiosity I looked up the city on trip advisor, and followed a path to a lake in the city.

I walked past a monument to WW2, which was beautified with a lot of flowers. It was backlit at the time, and there was a lot of fog too. Argh.

I walked past heaps of closed shops and cafes. Since it was early Saturday morning nothing was open. As it got to 0800 and after I could see some cafes starting their opening procedures, but they still weren't open.

Eventually I got to the lake, which isn't exactly grand. I watched three gentlemen fishing off a dock, but that was all I had time to do. I looked at my watch and realized I needed to turn around and get back to the train station.

Along the way I picked up breakfast in the form of a yogurt and water at a small market that had just opened. Thank goodness.

My next train departed on time, and for the first half I dozed off and on. At some point I woke up and stayed awake for the rest of the ride. It was a pretty ride, as it went through small mountain towns.

Finally, we arrived in a small town called Vorokhta. It is definitely a town dependent on tourism (hiking and such in the summer, skiers in the winter,) but still holds onto it's original identity. Like many parts of Ukraine, this area has been part of various empires throughout history. If I remember my reading correctly, it was once part of Austria Hungary, though you don't see any remains of that anymore.

I walked to my accomodation and checked in. I had booked myself into a cabin of sorts, sharing a living room with another couple. I didn't spend time in the living room, neither did they. Though I did take a photo in there at one point, because I loved the lighting coming through the giant windows.

After relaxing for a while, I went walking. I'd looked up the city on trip advisor and found a few sights. The first place I wanted to see was an old aqueduct/train line.

On the way there, I stopped at a church. The front gate was closed but not locked, so I opened it and went in. The church itself was locked, so I just wandered the grounds. This was a wooden Orthodox church, with very bright and shiny onion domes.

Another stop on the way was to pick up a snack at a small market. Who knew wasabi flavoured crisps could be so tasty?

I got to the street leading me to the old train line/aqueduct and followed it. The aqueduct is built over water, and most of it is surrounded by barbed wire. Notice that I just said most. I kept walking and eventually found a place where the barbed wire had fallen down. (Or maybe someone else had torn it down? I don't know. Either way, it was easy for me to step over and get a little closer.) I set up my tripod and tried to take a photo. It didn't work the way I wanted it to, but oh well.

Really close to the old train line is the new train line. I found steps leading up to the new train line, so up I went.

On both sides of the tracks I walked along sidewalky sort of paths, there were several areas that looked like lookout places. They were small areas that went out a little further, though I'm not sure what anyone would be looking at while standing in these areas.

I also took photos of the small shacks at each end of the bridge part of the train track. I presume someone stands in these shacks from time to time? Though both were completely abandoned, with broken glass and falling down signs.

I made my way back to the main road I'd originally followed, and kept going.

Not too far later I got to another church. This one was also wood, but with silver coloured onion domes. The front gate was open with this one, but again the church itself was not open. I took my photos and left.

Right next to this church was a pathway with a small green bicycle on a sign. I decided to follow it and see where it went. This turned out to be a great decision, though rather exhausting. First it went through a residential area with individual homes. Some of the homes had chickens on the property, others had larger properties that could almost be small farms.

Eventually the path started going though trees. These trees had been planted, so the lines were straight, but I was still happy to be among trees. Most of the path had been dirt, with the occasional section of gravel and larger rocks as 'paving.' When the path went through the woodsy area it was just dirt, with plenty of ruts. There was mud in some of these ruts, I tried to avoid it.

Unfortunately, I wasn't always able to avoid the mud. In one place, I thought my feet were going to safe places, but I was wrong. I sank into mud. Yuck. Somehow I managed to avoid falling over and getting mud everywhere, thank goodness.

I continued following the path for a while until a random place that seemed like a good place to turn around. Going back was a lot faster, as it was all downhill.

When I got back to the town center I realized I was super thirsty. I was kicking myself for not bringing my camelbak during this weekend trip, especially knowing I would be doing some hiking. Argh.

I stopped in the same mini mart as before, and bought a big bottle of water, and started drinking the water approximately 5 seconds after paying for it.

I went back to my accomodation and washed off my feet and shoes. By this point almost all the mud had dried on my feet and shoes, but I was still determined to get rid of it.

Eventually I went to find dinner. Trip Advisor only lists three restaurants for Vorokhta, it's definitely a small town. I went to the closest place, which was still almost a kilometer away. That's not a big distance, but my feet were tired from the walking I'd done earlier in the day.

Dinner was good, though I ordered too much. A meat soup, grilled vegetables, potato pancakes, and a dessert with berries and cream.

The next morning I woke up to heavy fog. It was actually kinda nice, knowing I didn't need to get moving fast to see as much as possible. I knew I wouldn't be able to see anything in the fog.

I went to breakfast at my place at 0900. By this point most of the fog had burned off, I could even see some blue spots in the sky. Yay.

Go figure, after breakfast it started raining. Not crazy hard, but definitely enough to keep me from starting my daily walk for a few hours. Oh well. Though I do want to see as much as I can, sometimes actually resting during a long weekend is a good thing. The rain (and sometimes thunder!) lasted until 1500 (3pm) which was rather annoying, (but awesome at the same time,) but eventually I got to go out.

When I went out I walked the same way I had initially the day before. I walked to the end of the road on which my accomodation was located, but went slightly further. It wasn't exciting, but I did cross the train tracks.

I walked back to the main street of town and turned left, the opposite of the direction I'd gone the day before. I walked back toward the train station, stopping at a souvenir shop along the way to buy a magnet. They had postcards available as well, but the postcards were for the region as a whole, and I much prefer to buy postcards of places I've seen.

The train station in Vorokhta is small, I crossed the tracks to get to a street on the other side of the tracks. There is a set of stairs and a pedestrian bridge going over the tracks as well, but getting to the tracks meant going back out to the street. It was easier just to cross the tracks.

On the other side of the tracks, on the street across the tracks, I found another church. This one was totally different from the other churches I found in town. This one had a Madonna in front of the church, and was built of brick. The front door wasn't open, so I was only able to look at it from the outside.

The one thing it did have in common with the other churches I saw in Vorokhta was that it was small.

Further down the street I looked off to the side and saw a small waterfall and creek. Next to the creek was a path, so I followed it. There were more mini waterfalls along the way, though the path got muddier and muddier as I went. I found a bridge to cross the street, made of small tree trunks. It wasn't super strong, but it was mostly stable. I crossed it, and unfortunately wasn't able to go much further, as the mud got out of control. I had two options: walk through water or walk through heaps more mud. I turned back and went back to the street.

Further along the street I saw something I'd seen on a few magnets, but was not listed in any of the travel apps. An old ski jump!! At least, it looked old to me. I found my way inside (the gates were open) and got closer to the jumps. I saw the old ski lift, it looked really sketchy. It wasn't running, and to me it didn't look like it would be running anytime soon.

The lift went straight up the hill of course, and I saw a set of stairs going up the hill as well. The stairs were made of cement, which didn't look like it was in good condition, but I started climbing them anywho.

At one point the stairs changed from cement to metal of some kind. The metal was rusty in most placs, and looked even worse than the cement stairs. Still, I followed them up the hill.

At the top of the stairs I found the top of the chair lift. It didn't look any better than the bottom of the lift looked. Not too far from there I could see the top of the ski lift.

I had to climb more stairs to get there, as the top of the lift was more steep than the slope of the hill. The stairs were in terrible condition, convincing me the place was abandoned. Entire missing sections of stairs, flimsy metal railings, rotted boards, etc...

I got to the top and loved the views over the entire area. That being said, I didn't stay up there for long because I didn't trust the stairs very much. I went back down, stopping halfway at a building of some sort. I'm not sure what the building was used for, but I presume it was used during jump competitions of some kind.

For once I was relieved when I got all the way back to the bottom of the jump complex.

Normally I love abandoned facilities, but this one scared me a bit. When I got to the bottom I looked it up online, and found it out it is still being used!!! That's downright scary. Wikipedia told me it is the biggest of five ski jump facilities still being used in the country. The last time it was updated was in the 90s, and the powers that be have acknowledged that repairs need to be done. No kidding.

From there I walked back home, and ate dinner in the dining area. I'm not sure if the place normally serves dinner on Sunday evening, or if I was just late, but I was the only one eating in the room, and the kitchen staff had all gone. Oh well, I was happy with the food.

I love sleeping in a place like this. It was silent outside, and there were no lights to shine in my window. If only this was possible more often.

The next morning I'd arranged to eat breakfast at 0900. I first woke up at 0620, then again at 0908. Ooops! Thankfully I was able to change clothes quickly and get down to the dining room by 0915. I had the same breakfast as the day before, they had the food ready for me.

It wasn't raining, but it was very cloudy, so I stayed inside for several hours and didn't do much of anything productive. I must admit, it felt good to relax.

When I did start walking I followed a path I hadn't explored before. It took me to a tiny little chapel, past heaps of wooden houses.

All the houses had been painted at one time, but now all the wood looked old to me as I walked past. Winter must be tough in Vorokhta, the houses must be stronger than they look.

Eventually I got back to a paved road, it happened to be the one that led to the old and new train lines. I was tempted, but didn't climb up to them again.

When I got back to the main road of the town, I turned west. I walked past more wooden houses, and found most of them to be quite picturesque. It was windy, and clouds were rolling through, so I was constantly afraid it would start to rain. Thankfully, it never did.

I got all the way to the edge of Carpathian National Park, I wish I'd had a car and hiking map and more days to do proper hiking in the area. As it was I walked a couple mini paths I was able to see from the road, though I didn't go very far. (I waited much too long to get going on this day.)

Eventually I found a place on the road that seemed like a good place to turn around. I walked back toward my room, stopping to pick up several varieties of cookies on the way.

I had the same dinner as the night before, the food was ready for me. One of the items was a Greek salad, I loved that the people in the kitchen had noticed and remembered that I didn't eat the olives the night before.

After dinner I went to bed. I didn't sleep, but it was good to rest. I got up at 0045, showered and packed up. Around 0130 I started walking to the train station. The walk wasn't long, only 15 minutes or so.

My train left at 0211 I think, or a few minutes afterward. Somehow it wasn't considered a night train even though it was the middle of the night. As I looked around I saw heaps of people like me who were laying down on the seats and trying to doze off while they could, but there were no sheets and mattresses.

The train arrived on time at 0440 in Ivano Frankivsk, the oblast capital.

I would love to come back to this area and explore/hike more!!