A Winter Hike. Climbing a Snow-Covered Terrikon

Few people go on winter hikes or walks along snow-covered roads. The short daylight hours and the whims of the weather make their own corrections to travellers' routes. But for those who have resolved on a brief bit of exercise and set off to stretch their bones on the city outskirts, nature will grant fantastic vistas, and a charge of vigour that will last through the whole of the coming working week. The fairy-tale white scenes and the winter freshness enchant and foster a good mood, and the second wind that opens up during the journey urges one to conquer white summits. If there are no mountain ranges nearby, hills and rocks will do. To climb a spoil heap, not sparing one's belly, is an ordinary matter for those who love to storm the cloud-high heights in the coal regions.

 

Malynivka. Folk Architecture and Green Corners

In Ukraine there are dozens of settlements named Malynivka. In almost every region there is a toponym formed from the name of the bright and fragrant berry. In the Donetsk region, judging by the articles on Wikipedia, there are no fewer than four Malynivkas, and one of them is located in the east of the Pokrovsk district.

Malynivka, Pokrovsk district, Donetsk region

Bakhmut I. A Station of Industrial Architecture

Bakhmut I station is a freight station of the Lyman division of the Donetsk Railway.

 

The Bakhmut I railway station. Donetsk Railway

Lozova. Three Hours in the Kharkiv Region's Second Town

In Ukraine there are hundreds of towns not marked on the tourist map that deserve travellers' attention. Each of them is wonderful, with exceptional architecture and unique monuments of nature and history. Life here flows differently and one breathes more easily than in the regional centres. That is why the residents of the big cities more and more often choose, for a day-off outing, trips to neighbouring provincial towns with rare highlights. Lozova in the Kharkiv region, with its convenient transport links, its natural landscape and its compactness, is very well suited for inclusion in weekend routes.

The Mills of the Dnipropetrovsk Region. Needed or Not?

The first steam mills appeared on the territory of Ukraine at the end of the 19th century. Most often they were built by foreign specialists using European technologies and were equipped with a steam boiler and machinery of foreign manufacture. The flour was produced of a finer grind than at water- and wind-powered structures. Merchants and landowners approached the construction of flour-milling enterprises not only from a practical point of view; they adorned the buildings with architectural decorative elements.

 

Pavlohrad. The former 4th-class mill with a production capacity of 625 thousand poods of finished output per year. Now an administrative and residential building

The Results of 2021: Travel and Toil Overcome All

Why should we take stock? Lately, we have all felt how plans collapse and forecasts fail to come true for certain reasons beyond our control. So we need to revise our schedules, our programme, and our approach to planning, and move towards realising our ideas. In the passing year of 2021, not all of our escapades came off, but we did not sit still, and discoveries, riddles, and achievements lay in wait at every step. A hike is a step out of your comfort zone, a sudden downpour, waiting for a delayed suburban train in a 17-degree frost, and even an electric shock from an accidental touch of an electric-fence wire. Every outing is always a sense of novelty and the conquest of a new summit — a chalk cliff in Bilokuzmynivka

 

Bilokuzmynivka, Donetsk region. Chalk cliffs

Mezhova. The Museum of Local History

Since childhood we have heard that he who does not know his past is not worthy of his future. The future will come in any case, but what will it be like for each of us? We are told that we must love our land and know the history of our native region, but exactly how to arrive at that is not explained very clearly. It is better to see once than to hear a hundred times, and visiting a museum is the best way to get acquainted with the historical past of your homeland, to learn about folk traditions, cultural heritage, national rites, and the culinary features of your native region. Museums are created precisely so that we can better recognise ourselves, our kin, and our roots. The People's Museum of Local History of the Mezhova area is housed in the House of Culture in the settlement of Mezhova, Dnipropetrovsk region.

 

Mezhova. House of Culture

The Fursove Passenger Platform. The Story of Siding No. 5

The Fursove passenger railway platform of the Lyman division of the Donetsk Railway lies between the stations of Udachna (8.5 kilometres in an easterly direction) and Mezhova (10 kilometres in a westerly direction).

Donetsk Region. Cultural Heritage in Ruins. An SOS

In the Donetsk region, as throughout Ukraine, historic buildings that are famous landmarks of towns and villages are collapsing, falling into decay, and burning down. The destruction of the historical and cultural layer of this industrial region has been going on for decades, and since the early 1990s the number of neglected sites among the pre-revolutionary buildings has increased considerably. Some of the houses have owners, but they are not concerned about the state of their priceless property. Not all the historic buildings that make up the architectural face of this industrial land, or are simply important for preserving memory, are under municipal protection. But even those that have been granted the status of monuments enjoy no special privileges, and protected status has added nothing for these former masterpieces. Genuine pearls, whose history spans more than a hundred years, have potential and could be the adornment of towns and objects on tourist routes. If these works of architecture, these industrial monuments, were saved and, with the help of investors, turned into museums, offices, shops, and art galleries, they would bring both aesthetic pleasure and practical benefit.

Prelesne, Donetsk region. The abandoned Bantysh estate

Avdiivka. The Terminal Station and Trackside Settlement

The freight-and-passenger railway station of Avdiivka is located in the town of the same name in the Donetsk region and belongs to the Krasnyi Lyman division of the Donetsk Railway.

 

Avdiivka railway station. Donetsk region.