Adventure

One of the young ladies from the English club has offered to take us on a tour of Khortytsya Island. It is an island in the middle of the D'Nipro river where Cossacks had a male only settlement in the 1600s . Our new daughters are uninterested in going there, stating they have seen it “hundreds of time on school field trips” So Susan and I choose a time before our trip to the orphanage and we are off (The river flows through the center of Zaporizhzhya and on both sides of this three mile long island.)

Off we go on the bus after meeting our guide at McDonalds. She, we learn is thirty something, is married and has one child. The evening before speaking with her on the phone confirming our days travel plans she has asked to be sure Susan and Ashley are coming also, Yes Yes Susan and Ashley will come also.

Our bus crosses a hundred foot tall double bridge between the City and the Island. Over the top of the bridge are train tracks and underneath a two lane road for cars and trucks. I am in memory of the San Francisco earthquake pictures of their double bridges as we cross. Suddenly we are away from the city. We are dropped off beside the road. There are trees, grass, and hills,  and except for traffic roaring or chugging past, depending on the age of the vehicle, this is all there is to be seen.

“Lets go this way” Crossing the highway sized roundabout without traffic signals we enter a forest pathway, heading down hill in the direction of the river. On our right the bridge is now high above us with trains regularly crossing on the upper deck the cars underneath.

Our guide speaks very good Russian accented English. We are learning about each other and what each likes to do. She tells us she is, “how do you say it; Adventurer!” Likes to run, Ski, rock climb; five miles before breakfast, No problem. She is a size zero, and wants to bungee jump off a local bridge and to skydive “Oh this is my dream” she exclaims. Does she realize she is out with “drive your car to work Susan and Dave”?

The area is beautiful, the light reflects off the broad river and sun lit clouds as a strong breeze drives them hurriedly across the sky. In the near distance some eight kilometers to our left is the huge hydroelectric dam which powers the city, built by a joint Russian/Ukraine/US venture in the 1920s before relations went bad it is a third wider than the hoover dam but not as tall.

We have reached the river after a twenty minute walk down hill through the forest. Along the shore the landscape is equal to the New England coast. Boulders and flat rock rising out of the ground. All granite and tumbled over each other like the man made break waters near the Venice Florida jetties. “Let's go this way”

?What?

We head down and up along a path skirting the shoreline. The wind is funneling through almost hard enough to move you off. At times we are at the waters edge, other times we are fifty feet up. I wonder aloud as to if I would bounce once of twice before reaching the bottom. This comment is not to Susan and Ashley's liking, but it is accurate.

Reaching the frontage before the Sich (fort) we head back inland and Uphill.

The fort showing early earthworks, blockhouse, walls and buildings is not to be missed. When we pay our admission we are asked if we wish to pay to take photos, No we do no. OK she says you can cake them. I am slowly reading the Russian/English sign, the photo privilege was 6rmb, (8rmb is ten cents.) There is a place where we strike our own Cossack coin, a blacksmith with hand made wares from a small forge, traditional clothes, a wooden orthodox church build post and beam in the traditional three room layout of the temple. The ceilings are some seventy feet high with no cross beams in the interior. It is breath taking to be inside and look high up the interior wood clad walls. Clear lumber 2'x10'x10' reaching in horizontal rows to the spired point at the top.

Leaving the fort we do not have time to take in the museum. But I run up an additional four story hill to take pictures from the top. It is very steep and I am breathing hard at the top, the climb slowing me as the legs become leaden.

Walking on South it is but a “short” three or so kilometer hike we descend and then climb again to the level of the next bridge crossing. We will walk across this bridge and back to the nearest marshuka stop. Then  leaving our present “adventurer” guide who refuses any more than our paying her bus fare, the bus carries our tired selves across the dam to meet with our translator then to visit the girls.

More to come.