Travel Note 6th July 2017

Yesterday morning featured a trip to the Belarusian city of Orsha, home to another Children's Park. Unfortunately the weather gods were not on our side, and while the staff made valiant efforts to assist us there was nobody on site qualified to run the Gusenitsa, a Wacky Worm of indeterminate provenance. Though the language barrier again proved a challenge, their body language suggested that they were genuinely sorry at being unable to assist, which cushioned the blow somewhat.

The day went from frustrating to challenging when the time came to return our rental car at Minsk Airport. The petrol station at the airport apparently had a technical problem, requiring us to drive several miles away to refuel. Then security staff refused to allow us to park the car in the location where we'd been told to bring it. Bruno moved it to the short term car park, but then the rental office told us that we'd taken too long after arrival at the airport and that they'd need to charge us for an hour's parking. They also said that we'd need to wait for the person who would check the car for damage, as he wasn't there at the moment. There wasn't enough time to do that after all the messing around, so we went to check in for our onward flight. Fortunately he'd materialised by the time the formalities were complete.

Our destination was the picturesque Ukrainian city of Chernivtsi, located in the west of the country close to the borders with Romania and Moldova. We'd chosen the off-beat location purely because of the presence of two locally built coasters within walking distance of each other. (At one stage there might have been a third tick in the nearby city of Boiany, a short drive away, but that installation was taken down at some point between 2006 and 2010. Though there is no evidence either way it is entirely possible that one of the two versions in the area today began life there).

I was quite excited to land at Chernivtsi International Airport as it was by some margin the smallest airport I'd been to in my travels, a fraction of the size of the already minuscule Kerry Airport. The place had just one gate and no baggage reclaim facilities, as we found out to our cost when we walked through arrivals expecting to find one. Instead, inbound passengers were expected to wait on the tarmac next to the plane while the various suitcases are unloaded. After realising our mistake we pleaded foreign tourists to the nice man at the security door who kindly allowed us to retrieve our luggage. With that sorted we were met by Vasyl, a local guide who drove us the short distance to the Hotel Premium. He also pointed us towards a superb gastropub next door with an English-language menu that served top notch steaks at extremely low prices by European standards. It was only later that we realised that the costs reflected an enormous drop in value for the local currency thanks to the ongoing war in the Donetsk area.

Flight schedules necessitated a full day in town, and with that in mind we hired Vasyl to take us on a walking tour of the city with side trips to the two coasters. His assistance made things straightforward, and I'm glad that we took him on, as we saw quite a lot more than we would have managed on our own. He went out of his way to help us, too; when it became apparent that the rides at Oktyabrskiy Park were down due to rain he managed to obtain the phone number of the owner, and passed on our offer of a handsome cash bribe to come and start things up for us after the weather cleared in the late afternoon. The response was initially positive but subsequently failed after it became apparent that the operator had turned his mobile phone off, robbing him of a payday and us of an obscure credit.