Travel in Ukraine

[butchy]

Good afternoon - ahead of the forthcoming Euro's I was wondering if anyone on here has any experience of travel in the Ukraine? Am planning on travelling from Lviv to Donetsk, Kiev and then Krakow to fly back to the UK and was planning on a combination of overnight trains and hire cars for a group of 4 of us.

Has anybody had any experience of the Ukrainian roads? Are they of a condition that one would be able to travel ditances of 500 miles + without too much trouble/danger? Has anybody used the train system? There only seems to be one train per day/night connecting most of the major cities-how packed are these trains going to be?

Any other bha planning on similar travel arrangements for June?

 

[daveinprague]

My Ukrainian colleague is giggling...






She says there are pretty girls, nice food etc....but the roads...lol.... she thinks that somebody from the UK would find it dangerous and have a lot of trouble.
As far as trains are concerned, she says that her friends have already been moaning that during the Euros, all the trains are booked up......and they are very packed anyway..Good luck :-D !!

 

[CC2]

I went to the last Ukraine v England game and travelled by coach from Donetsk to Dnitpro, I have to say the roads were pretty awful!!!

However, this has not put us off, and we are intending travelling by motorhome and using it as our 'hotel'. The problem we are having at the moment is finding someone to provide insurance that covers Ukraine, apparently it is possible to purchase it at the border crossings.

I believe the flights are now stupidly expensive and the various news reports seem to imply that hotel accommodation is extremely limited.

 

[butchy]

Cheers Dave and CC. Indeed I do have some major concerns re the roads - surely roads connecting major cities will be adequate though?

Dave I was in Prague last weekend and was given your bar details by another bha fan who has frequented it - unfortunately due to the bitterly cold whether we did not make it away from the old town over the river which is a shame.

 

[CHAPPERS]

What WERE the authorities thinking when they awarded this competition to the Ukraine?

Oh yeah, about money. Ignore me.

 

[Gritt23]

What WERE the authorities thinking when they awarded this competition to the Ukraine?

Oh yeah, about money. Ignore me.

Champions League Final, Euros, World Cup, you'd think they suddenly had mega-rich oil tycoons greasing everyones palms to get all that without the adequate infrastructure.

 

[daveinprague]

Cheers Dave and CC. Indeed I do have some major concerns re the roads - surely roads connecting major cities will be adequate though?

Dave I was in Prague last weekend and was given your bar details by another bha fan who has frequented it - unfortunately due to the bitterly cold whether we did not make it away from the old town over the river which is a shame.

Shame, mind you, I was sick last weekend and so was my gf, so I wouldnt have seen you anyway...it was fecking cold though...im sure you had a good time though...
Was -18 quite a few times in the last 2 weeks... ...now up to a tropical -1


Butchy, my colleague says....even the major roads between cities are shit... and you will notice as soon as you cross the border from Poland....she gave me this link

- Google Search

 

[Arthur]

Cheers Dave and CC. Indeed I do have some major concerns re the roads - surely roads connecting major cities will be adequate though?

Dave I was in Prague last weekend and was given your bar details by another bha fan who has frequented it - unfortunately due to the bitterly cold whether we did not make it away from the old town over the river which is a shame.

I did the same journey as CC2 last time we played out there and I'll echo his comments the roads were shocking. We were in a mini bus so was probably worse than the coach for going through pot holes. No idea what it's like going the other way toward Kiev though but I would imagine it'll be more of the same. Just one long awful road with nothing about then all of sudden you'd come across a bar/shop with a few locals sat outside (on the way back was hilarious as they were pissed out of their brains!).

Expect nothing from the country and you won't be disappointed, Donesk is a very depressing place.....it does have a bar that has a shooting range though! Alcohol, guns and England fans....what could possibly go wrong?

I've applied for the final only. Was going to do the semis as well but it's the same weekend as the Stone Roses and I know which one I'd rather do. Not that England will get anywhere near the final, but you've got to dream eh!

 

[bardo]

The roads are not good and atrocious out in the rural areas. Also watch out on dual carriageways around Kiev - we were once travelling at speed in a bad rainstorm when a horse and cart proceeded to cross the carriageway in front of us! And by the way, just for the wags here who might know my age, it was 2005, not 1955.

 

[Lady Whistledown]

KIEV, Ukraine -- Europe's most dangerous roads and greediest traffic cops are in the same place - the former Soviet republic Ukraine, said President Viktor Yushchenko during a televised meeting with law enforcers.

Some 7,500 people lost their lives in Ukrainian road accidents in 2006, a 20 per cent increase over 2005. The year 2007 is on track (nearly 7,000 by mid-November) to be even deadlier, making a car trip in Ukraine four times riskier than in France or Belgium, and eight times more dangerous than in Germany, an indignant Yushchenko claimed.

"What kind of statistic is that? It is a direct reflection of the way you work!" the Orange Revolution leader told a glum auditorium filled with the leadership of the country's DAI traffic police force. "You are doing your jobs badly, and unprofessionally ... you should be ashamed."

The Ukrainian president's last visit to DAI headquarters, in July 2005, ended with a furious Yushchenko, a supporter of European politics and standards in Ukraine, declaring the organization dissolved. Yushchenko's decision to wipe the DAI off the bureaucratic books (it never really worked) came after a notorious June 2005 road trip with Yushchenko at the wheel of an unmarked government sedan. Traffic cops looking to cash in on invented traffic violations halted Yushchenko eight times over a 600-kilometre route.

"The assembled DAI leadership received the president's Monday comments in silence," Ukrainska Pravda reported. A few colonels busily scribbled notes.

Yushchenko during the tirade ticked off several nasty DAI tactics long familiar to most Ukrainian drivers. Police place traffic signs not for public safety, but where they will snare the most unwary motorists. Speeding law is ignored, but advertising signs are scrupulously controlled by DAI officers, the better to bring ad sign registration fees into the DAI budget. Extortion of bribes from motorists is not just tolerated, but expected by mid-level police managers as they get a cut. Correspondent magazine in an article entitled "The situation on Ukrainian roads is becoming a national disaster" singled out "a total absence of punishment" as one reason Ukraine's traffic police seem so uninterested in enforcing traffic law properly.

A typical fine for a simple traffic violation in Ukraine - for instance running a stop sign or driving with a broken tail light - averages between $2 and $4 dollars. A drunk driving conviction carries a license suspension averaging six months, but only after a court trial, and if the vehicle is needed for the driver to work, then most judges will throw out the suspension. The fine if assessed averages between $40 and $80 dollars.

"In fact, traffic police have very few tools with which they can influence driver behaviour," argued Evhen Kravets, a traffic police spokesman, in Fakty newspaper. "How can we tell if a particular citizen happens to be doing what a court told him?"

Even avoiding a manslaughter rap after running down a hapless pedestrian has, in Ukraine, its unofficial price. Provided the victim had no important friends or his family money, as little as $5,000 dollars split between the judge and state prosecutor will usually get the case thrown out, according to the Ukrainska Kriminala web site.

Another contributing factor to DAI inefficiency is officer salaries equivalent to $300 dollars a month, producing a 70 per cent annual turnover in DAI personnel, Fakty reported.

"With that kind of salary and retention rate it is naive to expect honest enforcement of the law," Korrespondent noted. Danger levels on Ukrainian roads are heightened, Yushchenko said, because police corruption extends off the roads.

A driver's license without having to take the test - or indeed knowing how to drive - costs in Ukraine's black market from $200 to $500 dollars. A vehicle inspection without the inspector runs around $50 dollars, depending on the make and age of the auto not being inspected. The Ukrainian leader at the end of the meeting gave police bosses "six months or else" to show substantial improvement. The DAI colonels and generals "showed no particular reaction to that demand either," Ukrainska Pravda reported.

 

[levski seagull]

This tournament is a nightmare to get to, flight prices are outrageous and the trains are woefully inadequate, i've travelled by PKP (polish trains) a few times, i think the carraiges are pulled by a donkey! Somehow i'm gonna have to get from lodz to donetsk (approx 1000 miles) using polish/ukrainian public transport, i might be better off hitching?

 

[Marty McFly]

Hitch-hike!

 

[Lady Whistledown]

Hitch-hike!

You haven't ticked the Ukraine off your list yet, have you?

 

[butchy]

The main problem is that there only seems to be one train per day between the main cities - there is rumour that more trains will be put on for the euros but nothing has yet been announced....anyone know any details about this?

 

[butchy]

Has anybody found trouble booking accomadation in Donetsk and Kiev - seems that the only accomadation available is camping unless you want to fork out £400 a night!

 

[Marty McFly]

You haven't ticked the Ukraine off your list yet, have you?

Haha. Not yet. I'll be in Poland around this time, so it'd be rude not too head over to Ukraine.

 

[Czechmate]

Roads are awful , trains always quite packed and very hot , so in June will be very uncomfortable , took me 32 hours from Czech Republic to Kiev as they have to change the wheels and axels as they have different gauge from the rest of Europe . Try and get sleeper if you can as at least you may be able to sleep a bit better on the long trips . I will be going from Czech to the qualifying group games so hope prices will be ok and Czech are playing in Poland . Might even look at staying in Odessa as nice place and sort of in between Kiev and Donetsk , although Donestk is much further .

 

[bn1&bn3 Albion]

Glad I didn't decide to go..