The farm

Natalia's Dad, Ivan, has a farm, about 30 miles away from downtown Ternopil.  The farm is perhaps about 10 acres.  He grows many kinds of grains, raises chickens, sheep, pigs, rabbits.  He also has a sizable orchard.  The man used to work for the Ternopil city government.  Once he made to trip to U.S., and visited some farms.  That got his hands itchy.  He wanted to have a farm or his own, and operate it the American style.  Thus he did.  Now he is a full time farmer.  A man who pursued his own dreams.

Not my first time on a farm, but I haven't seen such a variance of farm products all at once.

Entered his "drive way".

The house he built.

 George and Maya.  And the happy dad, after away from the kids for the extended summer.

Pigs.

A BIG rabbit.

The width of the case is at very least 2 feet.  Not too big for her.

The king pig (in size), George pointed to me.

Sheep.  They are social, but only among their own kind.  George and I walked close (but still like 20 feet away), they all got up from the ground and left.  I hope it is not because I am Chinese.

Piglets are the opposite.  They would be all over us, if it weren't for the fence.

Orchard.  There are all different kinds of apples, plums, prunes, and I was free to pick anything I wanted.

So many apples on it, the branch couldn't take it, and broke.

I never realized that I had never had REAL apples.  Those from grocery stores or even farmer's market don't even compare these.  The ripe apples actually are very juicy, so much that after a stomachful of tasty apples, I found my t-shirt was full of drips on the chest.  I am not trying to advertise my table manner, but dripping juice from eating apples was something I never experienced.

And taste of these apple was indescribable.

Natalias's dad, Ivan on the left.  George, me, and Natalia's mom, Inna, on other side of the tree.

A shot of the house from the orchard.

Two cuties.

George cried after we boarded the train, missing the puppy.

Ternopil

Ternopil is another major city of Ukraine, also located in the west of the country, belonging to the Garlicia region, same as Lviv.  The city was built by Polish in the mid 1500s, later have seen Tatar attacks, Khmelntsky uprising, Turks / Tatar invasions multiple times, Polish, Russian and German occupation.  The city was also part of the region in the Hitler Stalin secrete pact, where it was taken under Soviet Russia, and in turn placed under the Ukraine SSR.

Ternopil is also Natalia's hometown.  We spent about 6 hours in Ternopil city, before we took a taxi to go to get to Natalia's dad's farm.

Arrived 10:30 at night, from Lviv.  This is a picture taken at the train station, although, the station was at the back of the camera.  It was too dark for a possible picture.

This is the second day in the morning.  We are taking a bus heading to downtown.  Out time budget was only a few hours.

The buses look all the same, in Ternopil or in Lviv, or in Kiev.

She is an actress.  Yet to find out more about her.

This is a map with all the attraction points.

All dolls with Ukrainian costumes.

This is the fun part.  Beer at a convenient beer shop (which is hardly any more than a stand), with dried fish.

Scales off.  Ready to eat.

The beer was great, but wouldn't be THAT great without this fish.  My next trip to Ukraine, among many other things, I will do that again.  What's good with Ukraine is, it ain't hard to find these stands.

Yet to find out who this.

A post

A well.

Out lunch.

This is a good casual restaurant.  Food seem affordable to locals.  For me, it was another good experience.  Food was good, as always.