Before the end of the USSR here used to be quite a serious industrial center with big granite mines, the landscape is therefore partially formed by this activity. Today it’s an empty space with beautiful cliffs and what locals call “canyons”.

I have always had many troubles with tourism in Ukraine (not only now). Toutism in Ukraine is very different from what one comes to experience in Western Europe – there is close to no infrastructure, the tormented Ukrainian history didn’t leave us with a huge architecture heritage and what we did manage to keep suffers from quite a poor maintenance. The Kotostyshiv canyon is no exception. We were stunned to see piles of waste in the middle of such beautiful autumn nature.

However, it’s also something that I’ve always loved about Ukraine – its wild aspect, its rebellious nature, which now protects our country from the invaders. It’s huge and spacious, and it makes you feel it. So even if those piles of waste broke our hearts, we didn’t regret driving all the way from Kyiv to enjoy this wild silence.

On our way back we stopped in a restaurant – we have many of those kinds along the roads. That was a true feast of Ukrainian cuisine with all its bests, almost too delicious to be true; I didn’t expect such quality from a simple restaurant in the middle of nowhere. A very warm family moment. The Russians destroyed this place in the first weeks of invasion. Like so many other places. I believe in Ukraine, it will be all right. The heart will be always aching though.