Львів

I'll have a...erm...

I realise that Lviv isn't in Poland, but it used to be!  And being just a bus or train ride away from many Polish cities I think I can happily find a place for it on my Poland blog.  It's very easy to see the Polish influence; a huge Ratusza in the middle of Rynok Square lined with colourful buildings, it could easily be any square in any major city in Poland.  But there's so much more to this place than Polish, it's a real mesh of influences, not to mention the Cyrillic alphabet.  I looked at a few menus when I arrived yesterday and felt sure that I'd starve here until I found a place where I could point at food.  Interestingly enough, food is weighed before it's served, you literally get what you pay for, or pay for what you get.  Only a day later and I'm already deciphering a few street names and the most common words, it's fun figuring it out.

Lviv is a great city packed full of monuments, churches and museums, I think it would be impossible to get bored here.  I visited Lychakiv Cemetery, which is one of the main attractions, it's absolutely huge!  There's a lot to see in there; statues, memorials etc, unfortunately it was rather unkempt, some of the graves were impossible to see, but it made for quite an interesting walk round.  

Svobody street, one of the main streets, is built on what used to be nothing more than a bog and the Opera House which stands at the end was the first building in the whole of Europe built on a concrete foundation; the river here still flows beneath the stage inside.  For the equivalent of 3 Great British Pounds I was lucky enough to see a ballet there.  Inside the Opera House it's lavish, golden and intricately decorated, and the ballet was excellent.

Slava Ukraini.