After leaving Lviv on another train I spent about a week in and around the Carpathian Mountains.

The first place that I visited, Jaremtsche, is a town with traditional wooden buildings, idyllic gardens that were still full of blossoming fruit trees and holiday homes called “kotedsch” (cottage) in modern Ukrainian. I also stayed in a wooden house which had a porch swing with a beautiful view (and WiFi reception). One of the main attractions in Jaremtsche is the waterfall Probii where I was able to make some interesting observations concerning local tourism. To reach the waterfall one had to climb first over the train tracks. A long row of souvenir stalls followed with dried fruits and mushrooms, herbal teas, honey, items made from wool etc. At the waterfall everyone ignored the warning signs and safety barriers in order to get as close as possible for a good photo. Close to Jaremtsche I followed a path that turned out to be a well marked hiking trail for about two hours up to the summit of Mount Makovutsya. I was rewarded with a fantastic view across the Carpathian National Park with some snow-covered peaks in the distance including Mount Hoverla, Ukraine‘s highest mountain (2061m).

On the way to my next destination Kolomyya, I made a detour to the regional center Ivano-Frankivsk, also called „little Lviv“ because of its Central European architecture and beautiful churches. One reason for the detour was the restaurant “Vegano Hooligano” that had been recommended to me by another traveller.

In Kolomyya it was time and the right weather, i.e. rain, for another museum day. The first museum I visited was the Pysanky Museum housed in a giant Easter egg. Pysanky, i.e. painted or otherwise decorated Easter eggs, are very popular in Ukraine. The exhibited eggs not only from Ukraine but from all over the world were painted with astonishing precision and very worth seeing. The other museum was the Museum of Hutsul Folk Art which showed the arts and traditions of the region like woodwork, pottery and musical instruments.

In the Carpathian region I travelled mostly with small local buses. Many of them have nice curtains with tassels and a front window covered partially by religious pictures. The first rows are usually occupied by older women, “babushkas”, with headscarves. Grocery shopping is done mainly in small stores, simply called “producty” (groceries), on the colorful markets or in market halls from the Soviet times.

My next destination turned out unexpectedly to be one of the highlights of my trip so far. The city of Chernivtsi, also full of glorious dated buildings, is the seat of a big university in the former residence of Orthodox Church leaders. The buildings in pseudo-Moorish, pseudo-Byzantine and pseudo-Hanseatic styles are spectacular but what was the real highlight was the festival around the Vyshyvanka day, the day of the traditional Ukrainian embroidered shirt that I just had arrived in time for. A choir competition took place in the main hall of the university with participants from all over Ukraine and neighboring countries. Some of groups with colorful and diverse costumes had musicians with them or were dancing. Later in the afternoon a concert in the beautifully frescoed university church followed. And in the evening there was more music on an outside stage in front of a huge Vyshyvanka with cheerleaders waving pompoms in the colors of the Ukrainian flag and people in the audience dancing.

I also had a travel companion for a few days, a longterm traveller from the US. This was a nice break from solo traveling. We had met in the hostel in Lviv and found out that we were planing to stay in the same hostel in Chernivtsi at the same time. So we met there again, visited the festival together and continued both to Kamyanets-Podilsky with its spectacular setting around a gorge and its impressive castle. Unfortunately there were heavy thunderstorms and we got very wet when visiting the town. The streets almost turned into rivers!