54 miles (87 km) – Total so far: 798 miles (1,284 km)
Wonderful breakfast at the little restaurant I ate at last night. Good fun staff who tolerated me translating the menu and my attempts at pronunciation.
Last night I sat up late chatting with the two women in the neighbouring rooms, an aunt and her niece, and their 5 children under 10 who were asleep. Amongst our topics was how education was under the Soviets (many of their family are teachers), and the new ‘TV’ President, who they were quite against due to his lack of appropriate qualifications and background. They said that the majority of the people just wanted a quick fix to issues, when the previous guy, an economist, had a more balanced approach.
A very rare bit of new road… just out of Kuty for about 10 km. Alas, things went downhill (figuratively only) from here.
Most of the day was spent going up the Prut river valley, quite gradually at first, starting at 330 metres asl, and up to around 500 metres at lunch.
All the bridge rails are painted in national colours.
These roads remind me at times of riding on the Carratera Austral in Chile. More than twice as difficult as a regular surface, and clouds of dust when a vehicle goes by.
The scenery was good all day though. This is the Carpathian National Park
Lunch in Verkhovyna, noticeably different to other Ukrainian towns I’ve been in. A 4 star hotel dominates the centre, and it is quite busy with tourists. The country’s highest mountain, Hoverla, is close by.
The next kilometres are more steeply up, to a high point at a pass of 945 metres.
Tonight’s stop-over just outside the town of Vorokhta, the Oberig Hotel.
Safe Return Doubtful 
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