Introduction to today's journey
Today's journey takes me into Kiev airport in the early hours of the morning where eventually get entry into Ukraine and take a taxi into the city. I explore the central city's Independence Square before catching a double decker bus on a city tour.
Today's Journey
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After a long early morning wait at Kiev airport, I finally get my visa and head into the city centre, stopping at Independence Square. |
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A large clock in the lawn near the back of the square. |
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View across Independence Square, with an underground mall beneath the pavers. |
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I do a bus tour around the city, with the Dneiper River winding its way through on its sluggish journey from its sources in Belarus and Russia to the Black Sea. |
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The Motherland Monument towering above a hill on the banks of the river. It sits atop the National Museum of the History of the Great Patriotic War between 1941 and 1945. |
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More of the city on the other side of the river. |
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A wharf on the river which has largely been dammed for power stations making navigation downstream to the Black Sea and Mediterranean Ocean impossible. |
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Passing St Michael's Monastery Chapel. |
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Returning to Independence Square in the early evening. The fountains here no longer work, perhaps due to the coming winter, but it is very warm here being further south - the warmest I've experienced since Beijing. |
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Independence Square at night with the Independence Monument towering into the sky, commemorating Ukraine's independence from the Soviet Union. The country is unstable now with threats of invasion from Russia, with the Crimean Peninsula on the Black Sea already taken. |
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