Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Eastern Ukraine
POP 19.6 MILLION
Why Go?
In many ways a continent away from the folkloric west of Ukraine, the territory east of the
Dnipro is often dismissed as 'not Ukrainian enough'. But from an economic and political
point of view this vast region is the country's power source. The industrial metropolises of
the east have sent more than their share of presidents and prime ministers to Kyiv as well
as providing both leaders of the 2004 Orange Revolution. It's also spawned most of the
country's billionaires, who, when the region's mines and steel works were up for grabs in
the 1990s, did much grabbing.
But Ukraine's east isn't all about slag heaps, oligarchs and high-ranking kleptocrats. It
also includes places that are key to understanding Ukraine, such as the Zaporizhska Sich,
Gogol's Poltava region and Unesco-listed Chernihiv. Even Ukraine's second city Kharkiv
has its moments, as do dynamic Dnipropetrovsk and Donetsk, the latter possessing
Eastern Europe's finest football stadium.
When to Go
May
The region is aflame with blooming lilacs and fruit trees.
