Today I got up earlier than I have been to visit the National Museum of Folk Architecture and Life of Ukraine. The place is “a huge open air museum with a collection of authentic houses and churches from all over Ukraine. They were dismantled and reconstructed in this historical park. Some houses are more then 200 years old. All of the houses are original (not reconstructions). Most of the are open and decorated with authentic household items.”
Firstly, I went to Silpo to get some snacks, then to Katyusha’s for a hearty breakfast. Since the place is a good distance from the center of Kyiv, the subways do not reach the place. So I used Uber to get a ride. Unfortunately even with the GPS built into the system my Ukrainian was not good enough to arrange the pickup.
Rather than confusing and annoying another driver I decided to use the buses and looked up the best route to the park. Sadly, as I approached the bus stop the bus I was looking for pulled away. Still eager to see the park I sat down to wait for the next bus and look to see if there was an alternate route. After waiting for what seemed like an hour, I decided to use the subway to jump ahead along the bus route.
And again as I looked behind me on the way to the subway the bus I was looking for pulled away from the bus stop. I shrugged and realized that I really am more comfortable taking the subway anyway. This time I was on the subway longer than any other time. I rode the blue line to the second to last stop. And began my wait for the bus that would be last leg of my trip.
It seemed like I had been waiting for 2 hours, a dozen busses had stopped and moved on, some twice, but none of them was the one that would take me to the park. In all that time I was asking myself if I really wanted to try one of the marshrutka busses that even the experienced travelers to Ukraine dislike. By that time it was 1:30 and I no longer had the recommended 3 hours of daylight for the park so I decided to give up the effort and head back stopping at the mall for more people watching.
And as you probably guessed, on the way to the subway I of passed the bus I had been waiting for. On the positive side I was able to use the opportunity to check out the Olimpiisky station and give the Ukrainian Burger from McDonald’s a try. It was kind of like a Whopper, but I think the patties were pork. Also by the time I got back to the apartment my feet were very sore without waking around an open air museum for hours. Guess I dodged a bullet, or maybe was pushed aside.