Dnepropetrovsk

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We did not have a chance to go to some internet cafe in the last couple of days. And this one has obviously USB ports disabled. So no pics 😞 And blog without pics is rather boring ....

Ok, at least few words.
We went to Volgograd, it was unbelievable hot !! Especially in a train car without airconditioning. I popped out my head from the window - hot air. In Volgograd it was around 40 degrees celcius.
We well remember how we we cursing at irish weather .... 😊

We visited museum of the Stalingrad Battle. Very nice. Can't be described in words.
some details here: http://panorama.volgadmin.ru/opis_eng.html

Then we went to see Mamayev Kurgan. Very emotional. All the sculptures, music playing, sounds of the war in the background, some speeches in russian - what was broadcasted in radio at that time.
And knowing that some 1mil. of Russians died in one single battle. The battle took about 6months. Germans after that surrendered, with hundreds of thousands dead or captured.
http://russia.rin.ru/guides_e/7278.html#

On one of the walls there were captured german soldiers depicted, in poor condition, frozen, hungry, exhausted ... and one sentence in russian saying: "Fascist soldiers, they wanted to see Volga: the Red Army gave them this "opportunity"..."
So, this was the turning point in WWII.
Andrew, an American guy whom we met in Kazan, and with whom we spent the time in Volgograd, knew this very well.
Nice lad this Andrew, is studying in St. Petersbourg, so he is quite fluent in russian language. That's why he could socialize much more with the locals. Especially the Georgian people were welcoming him very much 😊 As was it in one of the georgian restaurants. The lady was shaking hands with him as with their ally. Interesting. Andrew also gave us more insight into the whole Russian - Georgian conflict, he knew - unlike us - the background very well.

After that we went to Crimea. Complete opposite to Russia. Here we had problems to get rid of the taxi drivers. As we got off from the bus or train, people were offering us accommodation. It is something unheard of in Russia.
Water in the sea was very clean and cold. Prices are still fine, much better than in Russian.
It was a BIG problem to find tickets from there. Simferopol - Kiev: today - no tickets. tomorrow - no tickets. the day after tomorrow - no tickets.
That were the answer he heard for many directions. But we found some deals at the end. (Dnepropetrovsk - Lvov, for 13 euro ... dont know how many km, but 19hours ride 😊
On 26.8. we should be back in Slovakia. Yes, back already.

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