8th of October, 2021.
In the tourist officer building, because it is also the city hall, there is a guard inside the building and for some reasons he seems happy with my visit / presence. He shows me where I have to go. I talk with a guy and a lady and they allow me to leave my backpack. I get a free map of town, they give me some suggestions of which places to visit and that is it.
Chernivtsi is a very cute town. In the main street, which connects the centre, old town and the bus station, there are many incredible old buildings. They have a very charming architecture and most of them have balconies. Even though some of them are in a bad shape, with the balconies falling apart, they still look stunning for me.
The main attraction of town is the Chernivtsi National University. The buildings are beautiful but unfortunately you have to pay to walk in the grounds. Absurd!
So I take my way back and start to visit the other suggestions on the map. A few hours to walk around the old town and see them is more than enough.
Now, I don’t know if it is Ukraine itself or if it was all those stuff that Rulan and his son told me, but I have this strange feeling about the town and walking around. As there is something strangely wrong about it. Maybe is also because, even though the buildings are pretty and old, they all also look abandoned. The whole town looks like a forgotten town, abandoned by time and people. Not in a cool way, no. In a way that makes it sad.
When I go back to collect my stuff, I have a small chat with the guy at the tourist office. We talk about literature, mainly South American Literature, and I am surprised in how much he is interested on it. But we also enter on this abandoned town subject. He tells me that because of this whole country borders and division, who used to belong to whom, Ukrainians, Polish and Russians, many people don’t care about taking care of the historical buildings and the whole town per se. What a shame!
I decide for finally to buy something different and nice to eat. I mean, at the supermarket. But nothing fancy, just something different of the usual bread, tomato and cheese. I get crackers, a few different vegetables plus Arugula (which was cheap, by the way), which I can chop and make a nice salad to which I will add some ready dressing I also get.
It is getting late but I am persistent and confident that I can manage a lift to Kamiantes- Podilski. A nice old lady try to talk to me while I am hitchhiking. I am sure she is just trying to help. It is cold! After a while, a nice couple comes back, after passing by me. This whole thing happens then: they only want to drop me in the highway, because they though it would increase my chances, but the thing is, it is way too busy when we get there, is like a roundabout and too crazy. Plus now is really late already so I better just make my camp somewhere.
They don’t speak English so they call their daughter, a very lovely young lady. She explains everything to them, the fact that I will camp and stuff. They seems surprised and worried. Now, my original plan was, either camping by the bridge or by a Monastery. When we pass by the bridge to go to the highway, I see some homeless people living by, with their shacks and stuff. So I ask the couple to drop me by the The Monastery of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Horyecha. I wish I had more time to go around and visit it, but it is getting dark and I only have the forest around to make my camp, so I need to be able to see it.
I get really deep inside the forest, getting real close to the monastery and try not to be seeing at all. It is not an easy forest to camp, there are many branches all around. I hear somebody passing somewhere during the night. I can hear two men talking. Could be the Monks? Later on I also hear some dogs, barking a lot and coming closer and closer. I am not afraid of the dogs per se but of their owners. If there is any. The dogs could lead them to my tent. Even though it is hard to believe that someone would come down here where I am, in this dense forest, in the middle of the night, just to check. Nobody comes. And in the morning I leave as soon as the sun rises.