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Ukraine is a cradle of the Ancient Rus' culture and spiritual center of Christianity, which was introduced and adopted there by Great Prince Vladimir in the 9th century as the state's official religion. The Crimean peninsula, originally conquered for Russia by Potyemkin for his beloved Catherine, is today part of Ukraine, although its history and geography stand it apart in the region. Surrounded by the Black Sea it was where the nobility built their summer vacation palaces and many can still be seen to this day.
It boasts a Mediterranean atmosphere with delicious fresh fruit, fish and is lovely all year round.
An itinerary could look something like this, although it would be tailored to personal preferences:
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THE UKRAINE & ÑRIMEA
An itinerary could look something like this, although it would be tailored to personal preferences:
Day 1
Arrive in Kiev, transfer to htl
Day 2
Full day sightseeing - city tour including Golden Gates, St Sophia Cathedral, St Cyril's Church, Florivsky Monastery,
Podil District, walking along Andreevsky Spusk (pedestrian street)
Day 3
Full day excursion to Chernihiv with visits to Our Savior Transfiguration Cathedral, Trinity Cathedral, Boris and Gleb' Cathedral and Antoniev's cave
Day 4
Full day sightseeing: Kievo-Pecherskaya Lavra (Monastery of the Caves) with Museum of Historic Treasures on Lavra's territory, Vydubetsky Monastery, Defence of the Motherland Monument, St Michael's Church
Day 5
Transfer to the airport to catch the flight to Simpheropol and then met and driven to Yalta to the hotel Oreanda.
Day 6
City tour of Yalta to include Livadia Palace & Vorontsov's Palace, Tsar's Path, Tchekov's house
Day 7
Full day to Sudak and Feodosia with the visit to the Aivazovsky Museum (Aivazovsky is a famous painter of sea-scapes), overnight Yalta.
Day 8
Drive to Odessa via Herson, visit to Bakchchisarai on the way
Picnic lunch en route, overnight in Kherson.
Day 9
Drive on to Odessa (205 km)
sightseeing in Odessa to include Potemkin Stairway, walking along Primorsky blvd, Monuments to Pushkin and Duc de Richelieu, Opera house, overnight in Odessa
Day 10
Full day sightseeing in Odessa, Catacombs, Western and Oriental Arts Museum.
Day 11
Transfer to the airport to fly to Kiev, arrive in Kiev, half day in Kiev, departure transfer.
Kiev
Kiev, mother city for all Eastern Slavic peoples, is one of the most beautiful cities of the tour. One can't help admiring the Golden Gate (1017-1024) and the fabulous St. Sophia's cathedral, Kiev's oldest surviving church (1037) built by Prince Yaroslavl the Wise to glorify the Christianity.
Southeast of the main center of Kiev, spread over two large hills along the banks of the Dnieper, is the Kiev-Pechersk Lavra (Monastery of the caves) - a site of pilgrimage for Christians throughout Europe, that was for centuries Orthodox Christianity's "Rome". This 28 hectare functioning monastery possesses numerous churches, towers, a printing works, miles of maze-like underground tunnels containing numerous churches, ancient crypts, ecclesiastical objects and some of Kiev's richest museums. Among them are the Museum of Historical treasures, the Museum of Decorative and Applied Art, the Museum of Ukranian Books and Printing.
Yalta
From Kiev one flies to Simferopol - the biggest city of the Crimea. From it - drive to Yalta, one of the leading Black Sea resorts. Enjoy the work in the shadowy picturesque park of unique wild life museum, Nikitsky Botanical Garden, which is situated 6 km east of Yalta. About 28,000 species and varieties of plants, representing flora from all the continents of the globe, have been collected here, on the area covering 500 hectares.
The exotic Vorontsov palace-park complex, built in 1828-1864 for the regional governor Count Mikhail Vorontsov has got a grand exterior, embodying the features of a classical English castle as well as elements of oriental architecture. An extensive collection of the samples of applied art, sculpture and paintings by Russian and foreign masters are on display in 150 rooms of the palace-museum. Continue the trip to another wonderful palace - Lyvadia palace. The palace was built in 1910/11 as a summer residence of Nicholas II and was designed in early Italian Renaissance style, with Florentine and Arabic courtyards, using much Crimean white granite. Perhaps more famously, Lyvadia was the scene of the Yalta Conference in 1945 when Stalin, Roosvelt and Churchill decided the future of post-war Europe.
Chekhov House-Museum. Anton Chekhov, a great Russain writer, spent in Yalta the last years of his life, from 1899 to 1904. Here, in the White Cottage (as Chekhov's contemporaries used to call this house) Chekhov wrote some of his stories and plays "Cherry Orchard" and "Three Sisters". The light and graceful structure of the white cottage has been preserved as it was in the Chekhov's time, as well as everything connected with his life and creative work.
Not far from Simferopol we offer a stop in the town Bakhchisarai, which means "a palace of orchards", situated at a distance of 130 km from Yalta. Founded at the end of the 16th century, it was once the capital of the Crimean Khanate. The palace built for Khan Mengli-Girey in 1503, makes a great impression on visitors by its oriental magnificent splendour.
Odessa is the "sea gate" and at the same time "the capital of humor" of Ukraine. A lot of festivals are organized here. The city's opera and ballet theatre is one of the most beautiful in the world. The city possesses a number of museums, among them - Museum of Navy, the Art museum, unique catacombs.
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