Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Zaporizhsky Cossacks
From a Ukrainian perspective, the most significant group to settle in this area was
the Zaporizhsky Cossacks, who founded the Danube Sich just south of the Danube
(in present-day Romania) after being driven out of Zaporizhzhya by Catherine the
Great in 1775. Its loyalties split by the Russo-Turkish Wars, the sichcollapsed in
1828, and most of its inhabitants migrated back east. A few thousand Cossacks,
however, remained in the area, ensuring that a dash of hearty Cossack blood would
forever be ingrained in the populations of Southern Bessarabia and northern Ro-
mania (where a strong Ukrainian community persists to this day).
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Bilhorod-Dnistrovsky
04849 / POP 58,400
A simple day trip from Odesa, the 'White City on the Dnister' is an ordinary industrial
port, but with an impressive
Akkerman fortress
( 225 96; vul Pushkina 19; admission
15uah; 9am-6pm)
built by Moldavians, Genoese and Turks in the 13th to 15th centuries.
Today the castle is among Ukraine's largest and best preserved. You can walk along most
of the walls, which stretch nearly 2km in total, and admire the views of the Dnister's es-
tuary. Various 'medieval' activities, like bow shooting, are on offer.
Marshrutky
departing every 10 minutes or so from Odesa's train station (right side fa-
cing the station) cover the 55km to Bilhorod-Dnistrovsky in about 1½ hours (25uah), ter-
minating at the train station. There are also five daily
elektrychky
(electric trains; 7uah,
2¼ hours). To reach the fortress from the train station, walk along vul Vokzalna, and after
the park, turn right onto vul Dzerzhinskoho. From here, the fortress is a 1.5km walk.
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Shabo
In 1822 a few dozen francophone Swiss families from Vevey canton, led by botanist
Louis Tardane, packed their belongings into horse-driven carts and drove across Europe
to the Odesa region, which was touted at the time as Russian California. Taking over old
Turkish vineyards in the estuary of the Dnister River, they set up a colony of wine-
makers. It ceased to exist 120 years later, with the Soviet occupation of Bessarabia in
