The next day we managed to pack up and
leave by 8.45, not bad going for us. The walk into town with all our bags was a
challenge, especially since wheeled suitcases are definitely not designed with
huge flights of stone steps and uneven, potholed tarmac in mind. We made it
eventually though and, as luck would have it, a bus going to Lidavia Palace (or,
if you’re interested: Лівадійський палац in Ukrainian, Ливадийский дворец in Russain and Livadiya sarayı in Crimean Tartar) was
waiting at the stop.
Typically, the palace didn't open till
ten, leaving us with twenty minutes to wander the grounds and look at the views
over the coast. As soon as it opened we made our way to the ticket booth and
were able to get student tickets even though our student cards were from
Russia. At any rate, the visit was worth more than the meagre entry fee, as the
palace was steeped in interesting Ukrainian history. The estate was formerly
granted to Lambros Katsonis before becoming a possession of the Potocki family
and then of the Russian imperial family, who had a large palace, a small palace
and a church built there, and used it as a summer residence in the 1860s. Alexander
II often visited the estate, whilst his successor Alexander III lived and died
in the smaller palace. Following Alexander III’s death, his son Nicholas had both
palaces torn down and replaced with a larger building, which was influenced by
the Renaissance palaces he and his wife had seen during their travels in Italy.
The palace as it stands today was completed in 1911.
Most importantly, however, was the
role the palace played in contemporary history as the location of the Yalta
Conference, February 4-11, 1945, the second of three wartime conferences
between Britain, the United States and the Soviet Union to discuss Europe’s
post-war reorganisation. The other conferences were held in Tehran in 1943 and
in Potsdam in July 1945. Consequently, not only did the self-guided palace tour
include information boards regarding the palace’s nineteenth-century history,
but also interesting details about the decisions that were made in each room
and even the very places where President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Prime Minister
Winston Churchill and General Secretary Joseph Stalin sat around the conference
table.
After we had made our way to the exit
via the typically strategically-placed gift shops selling all the usual tat
that no one can possibly ever actually need, we made our way back to the bus
stop, where we sat on a bus and waited for it to fill up enough to depart. Somehow
we missed our stop and ended up at the central bus station, where we were
unable to get our planned bus. After bartering unsuccessfully with several taxi
drivers and even getting in one taxi before realising he had misunderstood
where we wanted to go, we took an alternative bus going to the Ai-Petri
mountain peak, (Ukrainian: Ай-Петрі, Russian: Ай-Петри, Crimean Tatar: Ay Petri), where you can ride the
longest cable car in Europe.
Everything was against us that day;
not only did we have to wait for over fifteen minutes for the bus to leave, but
the journey was long and slow through the mountains – far longer than
anticipated. When our bus broke down in the middle of nowhere, it felt like
there was no hope. We waited another fifteen minutes before another bus came,
and by the time we actually reached the cable car it was 2.45, only fifteen
minutes before the time we had planned to set off for the station from the
centre of Yalta, which was an hour away.
Just as we were debating whether we
had time to even go up the cable car after all, our question was answered for
us by the manager announcing that the cable car wouldn't operate until full,
which meant waiting for another group of people to come along, and who knew
when that might be. In despair, we asked if any taxis were going from the area.
Before we knew it we’d agreed to a price of 100hrn and were being led over to a
nearby car by a gruff middle-aged man, who emptied the boot of crates and
loaded it up with our luggage. It was only when we were already on the way and
hurtling through the precarious mountain roads that we realised we had just got
into the car of some random Ukrainian.
As we were driving into Yalta the
driver came up with a new suggestion; he would drive us all the way to Simferopol
for 45hrn (£38). Since we’d paid 35hrn on the way there anyway, this seemed
like a pretty good deal, and as soon as we realised, we snapped it up. It was
at this point that I realised we were already red-lining on petrol and wondered
whether it would be rude to point it out, since the driver was probably already
aware of this fact. I decided to preserve the peace since, by all logic, he
should know his car well enough to know after how many miles the petrol tank
would actually run dry…
We arrived in Simferopol at 4.30,
early and all in one piece – our risk had paid off. We had just under an hour
and a half to gather supplies and grab something to eat before heading to the
train, which sounds a lot longer than it actually turned out to be, by the time
we had found a half-decent food shop which sold more than bread and meat. I
could only find bread, crisps and cereal, and the guys ended up buying a whole
roast chicken.
On entering the station we discovered
that our train left at 6.20 and not 6pm as we’d thought, leaving us a bit of
time to make our way to the platform, laden down with our bags of clothes,
supplies and McDonald’s. Sitting in our cabin and scoffing down the crappy
fried food we’d bought was a feeling close to elation. It was at this point
that the conductor came round and told us, to our confusion, that we had to buy
eight teabags for our cabin, despite the fact that Sean had brought teabags and
a cup with him. It was according to some план,
which
I can only assume is something distinctly Russian or Ukrainian as I can’t begin
to get my head around it.
By 9.30 we were all exhausted and
ready to sleep, especially with the prospect of an early-morning border check
looming on the horizon.
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