Travel days to get to the Ukraine ~Day 1 & 2

 

We did it.  We finally got everything settled in at home with the help of a lot of great family and friends' help.  Thank you all.  We woke up bright and early at 3:45 am to get ready and out the door to the airport to make our first flight.  We were earlier than we needed to be, but early is so much better than late.  We cried as we said our goodbyes to our boys and boarded our flight.  We had a long layover (about 5 plus hours) in Detroit which wasn't as bad as it sounds.  There seemed to be a slight glitch with some of our paperwork in the Ukraine and the USCIS in the USA, but after several frustrating long phone calls I talked to our adoption agency and it was worked out after all.  Phew.  We were really freaking out for a bit there.

After our layover in Detroit we boarded our flight to Amsterdam.  I developed a mysterious tummy rash yesterday and took a bunch of benedryl for that.  Lucky for me I had the time to sleep off that benedryl coma!  The flights were OK and fairly uneventful.  There was turbulence and the TV's never worked, but other than that it was great.  We decided that we should spend our next 6 hour layover in Amsterdam actually visiting Amsterdam rather than visiting the airport.  We put our bags in a locker and went to the passport check to leave.  I have never done that before and was nervous about what I was suppose to say.  He asked where I was headed and I told him to Kyiv.  He asked about what the purpose of my trip was to Kyiv and Amsterdam and I told him adoption.  He thought Kyiv was a long way to come for something like an abortion.  I corrected him that we were coming for an adoption - not an abortion!  Big difference.  That sure broke the ice and made our conversation a lot less strict.  When we were finished he wished us luck on our adoption - not our abortion and told us to have a good morning.  We left the airport and boarded a train for the city by 6:30 a.m.  Not a lot going on in Amsterdam at that time of morning.  Really it is a city that you see what the 'morning after' looks like.  When we left the train station the first thing we saw were these rows and rows of bikes.  Crazy.  We didn't believe that they could actually all be used and claimed.  There were SO many bikes everywhere.

You can't see it all but this was a parking garage for bikes.  The amazing part is that the people in the city all actually rode bikes.  There were people of all ages.  I have never been so terrified of being run over by a bike before.

The city was gorgeous.  It was a very fun city to have as both of our 'first passport stamp' city.  It was very cold however and it really didn't help that we got there before the sun came up.  The only good part of that was that the sunrise was amazing over all of the rivers and bridges.  We walked up and down streets of closed shops for hours.  Honestly, hours and hours!  Not even the coffee shops opened until after 9 am.  Weird.  The first signs of life we saw were city workers and parents taking their kids to school, on bikes!  The parent would ride and the kid would hop on the back and ride side saddle down the street.  Very cool to see such a cultural difference from our city.

Most of the cars were these teeny little things too.  Spen really thought it was funny that I was taller than the car was long.  That just never happens.  It did feel weird to pose in front of someone's car, but it was a sweet little car!

I really loved how the roads and sidewalks were all pavers and cobblestone.  It made this gorgeous city even more beautiful.  I just wish I would've had gloves and a hat!

Every street we turned onto was just a pretty as the last.  We walked the streets for about 3 hours without a single shop opening and loved every second of it.  The only negative was that I wanted to go into so many of the museums and churches but couldn't.

Yes, even the bikes have their own stoplight.  They do not however, acknowledge them!

The bridges were breath taking.  Really, not built just for utility.  I loved that about this city. 

We walked to the Flower Market for my benefit.  We are just about a month early to see all of the tulips of Holland and it killed me.  I would LOVE to see that.  We got a glimpse of the tulips to come at the flower market and I took what I could get. 

After leaving Amsterdam - Which has a great airport, but horrible security procedure system.. (We had to screen all of our bags at the gate which didn't open until the flight boarded.  Long slow line!)  We flew to Kyiv.  Finally our last flight for a while.  Spencer has the best luck - and I have the worst.  This is just a fact to preface the part of our story where he got upgraded to a vacant first class and I did not.  I am lucky that I have such a sweet husband to let me sit in his seat while he visits with people back in coach!  I slept the rest of my benedryl off and it was great.
After standing in another slow passport line we got all of our bags, thank heavens nothing was lost, and made it right through customs.  We waited for about 15 minutes and saw Natasha come to rescue us.  She is amazing.  She had a car for us and we left for downtown Kyiv.  We stopped at a grocery store to get some supplies before heading to our apartment.  That store was awesome.  It had smaller selection of a lot of things, but of meats and cheeses, juices, breads, it was so great!  I loved having Natasha there to help us communicate with the people who work in the stores.  We drove to our apartment next and she gave us a lot of history and interesting facts about the city and buildings we passes on our way.  We were fascinated by it all.  It is a fun and gorgeous city.  Very different from home or from Amsterdam though!  We came to our apartment and worked out a few logistics about our schedule and she left us.  Here are some photos of our apartment.  It's very nice.  Cold, but very nice!