My Ukrainian Trip Part 2: Simferopol, Bakhchisarai, Sevastopol, Balaklava

[Karletas]

Simferopol - Сімферополь - Симферополь - Aqmescit

...to be continued...

[Karletas]

Bakhchisaray - Бахчисарай - Bağçasaray

[Karletas]

Sevastopol - Севастополь - Aqyar - Chersonesos

...to be continued...

[Karletas]

Balaklava - Балаклава - Balıqlava - Balaclava

The last name is in Genoese, my home dialect, since Balaklava was a Genoese colony and the ruins you see in the pictures are from the Genoese fortress called "Cembalo", quite a popular name here in my hometown.

[Dramblys]

Lovely photos Karletas. This park of Ukraine looks so exotic and relaxing.
The only thing I didn't like were the Soviet statues and Lenins.

[Karletas]

The only thing I didn't like were the Soviet statues and Lenins.

It's part of their (and unfortunately yours too) history, and in Crimea it seems they still like it. All street names are still the soviet ones, "father" Lenin is still up, tanks and air fighter memorials are in every town, Russian is the spoken language, the written language too and most people are actually Russian even if it's Ukraine. It's a strange part of this country, people living there are most of the time not originary from Crimea, but moved there in soviet times, and they were the lucky ones, I suppose... Surely Crimea doesn't feel Ukrainian at all, but it's not Russia either... quite complicated!

[Jeffas]

Thanks, Carletto! It's a very exotic part of Europe (?). Ukraine is amazingly large country with such a variety of cultural landscapes!... Especially if we compare these Crimean minarettes with the cafe culture of Lviv... I find it very interesting to think that Lithuania historically also had access to this Turkish-Arabic looking coast, and we even have the former residents of Crimea as our most famous ethnic minority (Karaims). Very exotic.