Wow... what a day! Even though we rented a van here and paid extra money for a permit to cross the border, and even tho the rental agent told me it would cost me $15USD per day to cross into Ukraine....today we got a bit of a surprise.
With one passenger, Mark, as a co-pilot going to Lviv, we left out at 0600 and crossed the border without too much delay. Just the usual cecking of passports, licence and registration for the van and my int'l drivers permit (don't come with just a US state driver's license). Once we cleared all that on both, the Polish border exiting side and the Ukrainian entering side,we were off to the races again.
About 5mi down the road at 70mph, the engine died suddenly, effectively killing 99% ability yo steer. So we coasted to a precarious stop, half on ahd half off the highway. After 10-15 min like that with cars zipping past without changing lane (That is a great law we have in Texas, BTW to protect our officers) when we could find nothing wrong, I called the service hotline. They informed me that we had been 'Geo-Fenced', whereby the car can be shut down remotely depending on its GPS coordinates. They said it had become too hazzardous in Ukraine. So much for the contract, the permit and the $15 bucks a day cost to cross into Ukraine. They only reactivated the vehicle after I agreed to immediately return to Poland - which I did, leaving mark there to catch a bus So... mission aborted, or was it...? Read on.
Here are a couple of pictures of the converted shopping mall I told you about.