Its Wednesday afternoon in Ukraine. We landed 24 hours ago. Victor and his daughter Dasha met us at the airport in Borispol and we loaded up the suitcases for the drive back to the village.
But first let me go back to where I left off... Saturday morning we drove into Winnipeg and got our Covid19 tests done, in the hope we'd have the results to print out before Sunday afternoon, when we planned to go to Winnipeg, since our flight to Calgary had been moved up to 6:30 am instead of later in the morning (Westjet has been cutting routes due to Covid). We started saying goodbye to the kids and finished packing our suitcases before going to bed that night.
Sunday morning I logged in to the MB health covid site and there they were, two negative results to get us on the plane to Amsterdam. We printed the page, along with the Ukrainian insurance certificates Victor had emailed us (for flying into Ukraine, Canadians don't need to quarentine or have a covid test, although others -eg Americans- do). Garry was worried that our printout did not specify what kind of test it was. We both got busy with other things until about one, when we tried a toll free number and they texted the results with all the details to Noah's phone and he printed them off for us to take.
Since Manitoba's code red was on the entire time we were there, we did not get to visit anyone, so I will just say we stayed the night in Winnipeg, had delicious Chinese takeout, delivered the stuff we brought from Ukraine and got a ride to the airport at 4:30 am.
It took a long time to check in for the flight, since she had to check all of the documents we needed for everywhere we were going. They all looked good, and we were off to Calgary where we landed at 8 am and took off around 3:30 in the afternoon. We bought bagels and hot chocolate at Tim Hortons and headed to where our gate was. D (international) terminal was pretty empty until about an hour before the flight, but had nice places for Garry to lie down and nap a bit. For lunch we shared a giant takeout burger and fries from chili's. Both A&W and Subway were closed, along with all but one shop and the chili's restaurant. Covid has really cut down shopping and eating choices at airports.
Around one o'clock they announced a bunch of names, including ours, and we took turns going up and showing our documents, once mine worked we knew we'd get to Ukraine and messaged Victor again. The couple ahead of me had orginally been going on Friday but had to rebook for Monday because of the Covid test.
We ended up with empty seats next to us, so Garry was able to lie across four seats and got a little more sleep, I had two seats by the window. We discovered that members of the Canadian speed skating team were on the plane with us, apparently at least one was using compression socks (probably not for varicose veins like me) I heard him talking about how he was prepared for the flight. Apparently the world championships are in Holland and they will be in a bubble.
The flight was pretty smooth, food was okay (I was disappointed however, there was no ice cream and not even the can of coke and giant bag of snacks halfway through the flight like on the way over, KLM). After deplaning in Amsterdam we went to their Terminal D and had a short wait for the flight to Kyiv. We were all the way at the back of the plane, but got through immigration and customs pretty quickly, our luggage was selected to go through the xray and Garry had to open it to show them the chain he was bringing for the chopper (forage harvestor) but then we got to go.
Back to the first paragraph, we left Borispol shortly after two o'clock, of course by 4:30 it was getting dark. The dark turned out to be a problem as after stopping for drive-thru at McDonalds (no eat in, we are under lockdown until the 24th) we discovered a couple of potholes that caused tire damage. We noticed two cars stopped fixing tires after we hit the first one, and just up the road we had a flat too, and Garry and Victor had to change it. The police came by and asked why we were stopped, Victor told them, our tire is almost fixed but there's two more cars up the road with the same problem.
Not ten minutes later we heard another loud bang as we didn't avoid a bad hole and Victor stopped; he opened the door, heard the air hissing out of a tire and they raced to find the hammer under the suitcases to pound out the dented rim and then plugged in the little air compressor to refill the tire.
Luckily we avoided all the really bad holes the rest of the way home. Victor dropped Dasha at home in Dnepro before long we were headed out to the village. Garry and I both dozed off and on for the last part of the trip. Victor called Vlad shortly before arriving in Nikolaipolia because he had made a pizza for us, and he wa standing out on the street waiting to hand it off to Garry.
Garry fell into bed soon after getting home at 10:30 and slept in this morning, I woke up early and unpacked the suitcases. Box was so happy to have us home she climbed into bed and wanted petting, I woke up at three am and there she was staring at me.
Dasha had mentioned on the drive home that they had predicted snow for Monday and Tuesday but it hadn't happened. Well I guess our timing was good because the storm hit overnight and there is about three inches of snow outside. The whole village is saying we brought it back from Canada.
Garry has had a busy day, talking to Max and Victor, buying a snow shovel, breeding cows (by two o'clock, he'd bred three cows). The neighbor came over to talk to him about breeding his cow and renewing the car insurance on the Geely (little while car) because it expires today (it cost 20 dollars for the year). Now Garry's busy making plans to build trusses for another heifer barn, the quonset is empty on one side, so they can work inside. Victor phoned to order the lumber.
Meanwhile back in Manitoba, my yarn was delivered yesterday. I ordered it November 12th and thought I'd have it for Christmas. Garry's new coveralls also came on Tuesday, so if we'd stayed a little longer, but we missed driving through the snow and I will have yarn in May, since I assume there will be a two week isolation again.
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