Day 5 - Lviv's Opera House

On our second day in Lviv we toured around some more, mostly downtown again. This was the only cool day of our entire trip. Lviv is usually a rainy city but in the last couple of weeks before we got there it had been nice and the heat had been building up. But finally, the night before it rained good and hard and brought the temperature down. I was very grateful for this since it had been very hot (32°C +) since we had left Jena. It made walking around very pleasant. Here is part of the old city walls we saw as we were making our way to the Opera house.

Also a funny camera shop add that had a elephant made out of camera equipment.

Before the opera house we stopped at a Viennese style cafe for coffee and cake. Bela had berries, I had a fancy cake with some kind of orange sauce, and Julia had some opiate seed cake... I mean poppy seed cake. I fact it she said it was the best she had ever had... and she felt great afterwards... and she put on a very energetic puppet show for Béla using removable parts from the stroller depicting bird beaks eating his belly (which he loved). Unrelatedly, we also heard that poppy seeds weren't held to the same "fun" removing processing found in the EU and probably North America, but that could have been a rumor.
This was just across the opera house's front square where every kid was riding a power wheel. This is the traditional way for parents enjoy the opera in Lviv; drop your kid of in the front yard with his or her power wheel, then sit back and enjoy the show. I'm kidding of course, there was no matinee that day. These were however for rent on the opera square and kids would used them more or less like bumper cars.
Sure beats having to buy one.
Then we went to check out the inside of the opera house.
As you can see the 'usual' fancy marble and carved wood that is so commonplace in grandiose late 19th century buildings. Just being silly, it was of course beautiful and very reminiscent of the Vienna opera house that my parents and I got a chance to see last year.
We were willingly subjected to a tour of the facility by a very nice extrovert who was waiting to prey on unsuspecting tourist for a very modest fee. She ran us through a quick and concise tour complete with many photo ops. Here is one illustrating the use of mirrors to give the illusion of having yet a bigger space. And of course 400 hundred Bélas.
Up there, not a window, more mirrors.
Laughing, about cry? I don't know but there are more mirrors.
The stage, displaying this beautiful mural while in wait.
And the whole family in one of the balconies. I was not allowed to go to close to the edge as I was holding Béla.
After that Béla slept through another fine Ukrainian meal. This is one of the many pints of Kvas we had during our time there. The linked page doesn't really do it justice I find or maybe we were especialy partial to it because of the high temperatures and the fact that it really filled the non-alcoholic alternative slot nicely, often needed when traveling with baby. Basically it's a fermented rye drink. It's fizzy and sweet but in both respects far less than pop and is often sold on tap from kegs or giant tanks on a trailer. Delicious and refreshing.
Here is our 'tourist' room at the George (the less fancy and less costly rooms). You actually had to open two pretty big doors to get in the room, one opening into the room and one into the hallway, on either side of the 2 foot thick wall. We really couldn't say the walls were paper thin but I'm pretty sure they had secret passages in them.
A somewhat better depiction of the actually very classy hotel we were in. Marblely.
Also the included breakfast was a delight. They had the usual cold cuts, bread, fruit, tomatoes and cucumbers we've come to expect in Germany but also many hot dishes including crepe/eggroll creations some that had cottage cheese and some cabbage. Also the next day we had to leave very early to catch the train to Kiev and we were supplied with breakfast brown bags to go. Very convenient.

Here is a poker-crib-sushi-bar call Montana. Interesting combination.
Here is Béla eating some borscht for our last meal in Lviv. We also had there perogies and ribs I think. All delicious.

Then we were off to Kiev to see...