Rakhiv. I Wish You to Be Better, to Grow and Prosper

My first acquaintance with Rakhiv, forgive me for being honest, left no pleasant impressions. There were many situations I did not like. Contemplating the rubbish overflowing the mountain Tysa brought no pleasure. The trading kiosks fastened onto one of the town's main shrines, the Church of St John of Nepomuk, look highly unattractive. It is sad to look at the disfigured facades of the constructivist-style buildings erected during the Czechoslovak period. Do the cluttered Burkut Park and the unsanitary state of the mineral-water spring of the same name awaken any aesthetic pleasure? My notes from three years ago provoked a storm of disagreement from the town's residents, which is understandable. But three years have passed, I am in Rakhiv again, and I want to see the town's favourable sides and change my opinion of the highest mountain town in Ukraine.

 

Lviv. Forestry University Botanical Garden and Wood Museum

Lviv is considered the richest regional centre for the number and variety of its parks and gardens, each with its own distinct aesthetic. The Botanical Garden of the Lviv Forestry University is also a large green oasis and a charming adornment of the architectural ensemble of Ukraine's cultural capital.

 

Lviv. Botanical Garden of the Forestry University

Zarichchia. A Park Monument and Partisan Memorial

In the Nadvirna district, to the south-west of the village of Zarichchia, on the road to the village of Bili Oslavy, lies the national-significance landscape-gardening park monument «Park of Partisan Glory». This green landmark covers an area of 7 hectares at the foot of Mount Rakhovo (589 m above sea level). The emerald rectangle is located within the Delyatyn Forestry Enterprise’s Zarichchia forest district and has held protected status since 1983.

Nadvirna district. Memorial park of partisan glory

Liubizhnia. A Mountain River and the Liubizhnianskyi Huk

Look, the little mountain stream runs down,

It flows, it leaps down from the heights.

To her, proud to the very edge,

A peaceful life is beyond price.

But once she bursts out onto the valley,

She grows gentle forevermore.

You can't tell her apart from the flow

Of ordinary, untroubled rivers.

She drifts past, unhurried, by

Houses, forests, fields and ponds,

Dreamily leafing through

Her girlhood years.

19.06.2023  Alex Vinokur

Do you know what the foothill village of Deliatyn looks like from a bird's-eye view – emerald peaks cut through by valleys, in whose lowlands the Prut and its tributaries swirl in winding ribbons. The mountain stream Liubizhnia, a left tributary of the Prut, rises and is fed on the slope of the Carpathian ridge, where the mountains Studena Klyva and Vavtorova stand side by side; it flows eastward toward the central part of Deliatyn and forms the valley in which the settlement of the same name arose. With its stony bed and swift current, this blue ribbon of the Carpathians lays out its 16-kilometre course in the north-eastern Gorgany and hurries to meet its rebellious elder brother in the eastern part of Deliatyn.

 

Deliatyn. The Liubizhnia River

Lviv. The Honey Cave. Not just architectural landmarks

When picking the top iconic places to get to know Lviv, most people will mention palaces and townhouses, cathedrals, museums and parks. In the eastern part of the city there is a little-known landmark worth visiting for lovers of geology, speleology and motocross.

 

Protect the Beauty! Don't Pick the Spring Flowers!

The sun warms the earth, nature awakens from its winter sleep, and the world around comes to life and turns vivid. Sunbeams rouse the adornments of the forests – the first heralds of spring. We receive this priceless gift of nature every spring.

 

Crocus glades

The Malevskyi Complex. Picturesque and Little-Known

Despite all its achievements, humankind is inextricably linked to nature, which has given the people of Earth water, air, light, and warmth. People make everything they need for life from natural materials and forget to value and protect these priceless gifts. Nature offers visual aids for understanding the material world and inspires admiration for the astonishing beauty of the surrounding environment. One of the geological clues to the planetary order can be considered the rocky Malevskyi Complex, located in the south-eastern part of the sub-Carpathian village of Deliatyn.

 

Deliatyn, Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast. The Malevskyi Complex

Carpathian Forest. A Winter Walk to Recharge

A forest is always balm for the soul, a source of inspiration and reflection, and winter forest scenes amaze with their charm and stir the imagination.

Deliatyn. There's No Sea, but There Is a Sea Eye

If the tourist trail has brought you to Deliatyn, you absolutely must visit Morske Oko (the Sea Eye), a natural wonder of this Subcarpathian village.

 

Deliatyn. Lake Morske Oko (Sea Eye)

Yaremche. The Probiy Waterfall and Other Hutsul Wonders

Yaremche – a climatic and ski resort in Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast and a centre of green tourism – enchants visitors with its landscapes and its natural and man-made landmarks. 

Yaremche, Ivano-Frankivsk Oblast

Lviv. A Walk in Khmelnytsky Park

We go to a park first and foremost to gain, within the city, a chance to be in contact with nature, to break away and rest, to stroll the alleys and soak up the picturesqueness of a green oasis. The Khmelnytsky Park of Culture and Recreation fully meets the townspeople's needs and is one of the best-kept parks in Lviv.

 

Lviv. Khmelnytsky Park

Truskavets. Preserving the Protected Resort Park

Health treatment and rest in Truskavets are impossible without walks through the Resort Park, an ideal place for inspiration and peace of mind. This forest-park massif of astonishing beauty is intended for relaxation; it gives vital energy and tenderness to the soul. It is enough to wander the alleys, admire this picturesque corner, and grow stronger in health.

 

Truskavets. The Resort Park

Lviv. The Zalizna Voda Park and Its Green Riches

If you are choosing a park in which to watch nature and enjoy living natural scenes, the Zalizna Voda park meets the requirements of a quiet resting place for people of every age.

Lviv. The Zalizna Voda park

The Zhenets Huk. You could watch the running water forever

The Zhenets waterfall is one of the most picturesque and popular tourist spots in the heart of the Carpathians. The way to it begins on the border of Mykulychyn and Tatariv, in the Nadvirna district of the Ivano-Frankivsk region. From the "Tatariv" signpost the route westward takes, on average, about 2 hours at a slow pace, with stops to admire the natural beauty.

 

The "Tatariv" signpost on the H09 road

Yaremche. The Elephant Rock. Hey There, Carpathian Giant!

Travellers are always in search of places that leave unforgettable impressions. Ukraine has a host of wonderful spots to which even the most seasoned tourists, who have seen it all, want to return and feel something unsurpassed once more. Yaremche is a wellspring of natural and man-made landmarks that astonish, inspire and make one exult. In the central part of the town, east of the main road, stands a Carpathian marvel — the Elephant Rock.

 

Yaremche. The Elephant Rock

Lviv. Stryiskyi Park. To walk and walk

There are many reasons to love Lviv, and one of them is the abundance of parks and gardens in this overcrowded city, congested with traffic. Stryiskyi Park, the oldest park in Ukraine to hold the status of a monument of landscape-garden art of national significance, is considered by Lvivians and visitors alike a favourite place of rest — for its shady avenues, its romantic ponds with swans and little ducks, its sculptural fountains, its architectural gems, its attractions and its sports facilities.

Lviv. Stryiskyi Park

Rakhiv. Burkut Park, a Monument of Landscape Art

City parks, recreation areas, green oases - these are gifts of nature and man-made landmarks in industrial centres that have accumulated the inconveniences of crowded traffic and engineering structures. One of the most picturesque parks of culture and leisure in Zakarpattia is located in Rakhiv, in the north-western part of the town.

 

Rakhiv. Zakarpattia region. Burkut Park

Slavkurort. Awaiting the Revival of an Old Resort

Sloviansk resort is one of the oldest mud-cure resorts in Ukraine. Sloviansk has been known for its mineral waters and therapeutic muds since 1827. At the beginning of the 20th century, Sloviansk mud was recognised as the best in Europe and won the Grand Prix at an international exhibition. In Soviet times this resort of national importance was the most financially prosperous trade-union health resort.

 

Sloviansk resort. Donetsk region. The closed "Yuvileinyi" sanatorium

Bilokuzmynivka. The Cliffs of Two Landscape Parks

I never compare our stunning landscapes and astonishing, spectacular panoramas with foreign natural monuments. The fawning turns of phrase heard in every region of Ukraine towards foreign curiosities, with invented names like "Rivne Iceland", "Donetsk Maldives", "Ukrainian Venice", "Zhytomyr Switzerland", and the like, are surprising. Perhaps our picturesque mountains and cliffs, lakes and rivers have not won worldwide fame, but they arouse no less admiration and are quite well known to the Ukrainian traveller. So let us cherish and popularise the tourist gems of our own country — the unrepeatable landscapes with their own peculiarities, history, and national colour. Ukraine will always remain Ukraine, without obsequiousness or servility, and in every region there are exotic places, wondrous locations that one wants to tell about and to show to guests and travellers.

In Donetsk region, one of the most inspiring landscapes, where you can draw a reserve of energy, opens out across the steppe expanses 10 kilometres south-east of Kramatorsk and 13 kilometres east of Druzhkivka.

 

The "Kramatorskyi" Regional Landscape Park. The Bilokuzmynivka section

Sloviansk. The Salt Lakes. Rest and Restore Your Strength

One of the most popular medicinal places in Ukraine, where people rest, restore their strength, and take the cure, can be considered the group of lakes in Sloviansk, Donetsk region. A priceless gift of nature — the only salt lakes of natural origin in Ukraine, located far from the sea's expanses, in the basin of the river Siverskyi Donets.