My first visit to one of the plethora of small wooden churches in this corner of Europe that provide three separate World Heritage Sites, was a rather enjoyable, if short experience, in a town that I would otherwise have no real reason to be in.

I hadn’t planned to visit this site, but an early landing at Lviv’s new airport and very swift passport control meant I was curbside about an hour before I thought I would be. Off the cuff I looked at the map on my phone I realised that the Tserkva of the Holy Trinity in Zhovkva was only about 45 minutes away, all that time our coommunity put into plotting sites on a map suddenly paid off!

A quick negotiation with a taxi driver, in some combination of English, Ukrainian, Russian and me taking wild stabs at the few words of Czech I know and hoping they would make sense meant I was soon in the back of a Skoda heading over the potholes and cobbles of the Lviv ring road.

About 35 minutes later I was deposited at a this tiny church with reassurances that the driver would be back in 15 minutes.

This 15 minutes was actually probably three times the amount of time I needed. As it was a beautiful Sunday morning there was a service happening inside. Even if I was of a mind to visit during the sermons, the church is so small there wasn’t even a chance to sneak into a corner without disturbing everyone inside.

So that just left me able to walk several laps, focusing on the intricate details of the wooden construction that apparently help differentiate them from other inscribed Wooden churches; the flat plank corner construction, the three doomed cupolas (of which this is apparently the finest example) and the stone belfry. It also allowed me to find the notice board engraved with the term “World Heritage Object” confirming my trip hadn’t been wasted.

It was enjoyable and I was able to catch a glimpse of the interior as one of the congregation caught my eye and beckoned me to the door to have a closer look. It certainly was an impressive array of gold frames around the painted robes of various saints, but I didn’t want to intrude so wandered back to meet my taxi driver who quickly took me back to my hotel in central Lviv.

All in all it was about an hour and a half from Lviv airport to Zhovkva, to visit and then being dropped at my hotel in central Lviv. I can’t seem to find details on the train service even though Zhovkva does have a station, I couldn’t find anything online that suggests trains actually service this route, but there seem to be very regular buses that depart from Lviv 2 (Northern) bus station.

But with no planning and limited time I had to go for the slightly less rewarding option of a a taxi and it was a pretty straightforward journey to organise, the whole trip cost me in the region of 500UAH/ €15 (2019). The bus seems to be about a tenth of that cost and takes between 20 and 40 minutes each way. Though you will have to factor in getting out to the Northern bus station if you are coming from the city centre.

It certainly felt like a wonderful little side trip and easy to achieve from Lviv. The site itself was rather lovely, though even if you could visit the interior it would still take a very forensic investigation to make a visit last more than 25 minutes.

Site 4: Experience 5