Odessa, Ukraine
46° 28' N 30° 44' E
Oct 21, 2007 10:23
Distance 346km

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The cold winds of Siberia

Text written in: English

21 Oct 07 Odessa

The weather was overcast, cold and windy - apparently we were experiencing the winds from Siberia!  Jo had a chance to wear her lovely leather coat she got in Florence. 

We decided not to do any organised tour and took ourselves off into town.  As it was a Sunday the place was a little tardy in getting started.  We walked up a couple of hundred steps to take us into the main avenue.  That was our gym work out for the day.

Lots of cats and dogs roaming around very mangy and bedraggled! Apparently people just dump their pets and they scavenge around the city.

Walked around and found a little out door market with handicrafts.  The stall holders all think that we Americans and put up the prices on all their crappy goods!

Further on we found a relatively new shopping mall.  Went in to the supermarket to buy some more laundry detergent as we have run out.  My we are getting good at charades in making ourselves understood by people who speak no english and we do not remotely understand their language.  We are hoping that we have bought the right stuff and not just fabric softener!

We exchanged some Euros and had a wheelbarrow provided to take away the local currency!!

Found a little place to have coffee and ordered an American coffee with milk - and wonderfully we ended up with Lattes!  Jo went back for a second cup just to get her fix!  They were sooooo cheap under $2 a cup.

We wandered along the shopping strip and continued to see police and military at just about every cross road.  It was a really cold and windy day and in one shop we noticed a guy who was either their store security or one of the militia taking refuge from the cold standing in the front of the shop with his sub-machine gun!  Boy they must have problems with shop liffters...

Again we had a chuckle to ourselves about the men in black.  When we were in the shopping mall we met up with some of our sailing buddies whilst we had coffee.  We were tucked in a corner sitting and chatting for almost 45mins and during this time a guy pushes in past us to sit to the back of us with his coffee and cake and listened in to everything we said. Whilst we watched the MIB standing on the levels above us who were also watching us.

We explored the town further looking at some lovely old buildings such as the Opera Centre and the local Town Hall.  We walked back along the tree lined avenue and back down the steps to our ship.

Of course we were back in time to have lunch and we mooched around the afternoon until Happy Hour. 

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