Hi everyone!

My name is Misha, I'm 16 years old and I live in Ukraine, and this is my first post on Steemit.

Having been born and raised in three different countries, I've been lucky enough to travel quite a lot around the world.

This summer, as usual, I went on a roadtrip with my family around Ukraine.

In mid-August, I went to Bukovel, a popular ski resort in the western part of the country. "Why would anyone go to a ski resort in summertime?" you might ask. Surely enough, when I arrived, there wasn't any snow around, and to add insult to injury, it was quite hot outside — around 30 degrees Celcius (86 ℉ ).

Upon arrival, I've spent the first couple of days tasting local cluisine at nearby restaurants, going on cable cars, which fortunately were still operating, as well as just enjoying the grassy alpine view of the town, which reminded me a lot of my years of living in Switzerland (a story for another day, who knows?).

The next day, I was walking outside with my mom to buy a couple souvenirs for some relatives. Next to the ticket shop was standing a man handing out leaflets. Living in the busy city of Kiev, I didn't pay much attention to him, but to my surprise, my mother decided to take one and check it out. I realised it was an ad for a travel company which offered guided excursions to well known touristic locations, one of them being Hoverla, the 2061 meters (6762 ft) high mountain situated near the Romanian border.

Living in Ukraine as a kid, I used to hear a lot about the place on TV, since a former Ukrainian president had made it a tradition to scale the 2000 m high summit to celebrate the signing of the country's declaration of independence.

On the following morning, equipped with just my backpack, a hoodie and Nike sneakers I had bought last spring, I was waiting with my mom for the tour bus to arrive outside our hotel. During the hour and a half drive to the foot of the mountain, located about 20 kilometers (12,5 miles) away (it was quite a bumpy road), the bus got filled up with about 10-15 people. Once at the checkpoint, we got out, rented two pairs of walking sticks, and waited for the tour guide to prepare us for the ascent.

The climb began.

First, we went through a deep forest, mostly walking uphill on top of tree roots, as well as little wooden bridges to cross the narrow strips of waterfalls flowing downwards. When we got out of the woods, we found ourselves on a small meadow with a bench and a milestone pointing to the path leading to the peak.

After a 5 minute rest stop and waiting for everyone to get there, we went on walking. The landscape suddenly started to change. Rocky hills started to appear and needly bushes were now filling our path. I stopped for a while and drank some water, glancing upon the beautiful hilly landscape underneath me.

In 20 minutes or so, I was already ahead of everyone. I started seeing more and more tourists ahead of me, and as I got up the following hill, the mount peak came into my view. I was halfway there.

The climb from then on was by far the hardest. The mountain got steeper and steeper and I could no longer see the group following me. I took a couple pictures, had some more water and kept going.

It was at that point that I realised my choice of footwear wasn't that great, since I noticed my shoes were getting quite a bit muddy. But I didn't care much. I was almost there, and that's all I could think about.

After a couple rest stops near the summit, I had no more than 100 meters to reach the peak. After getting my second wind, I almost ran up to the top happily.

I did it.

"Finally, I'm here", I thought to myself with a sense of joy and relief.

The place was quite windy and crowded with tourists. In the middle of the mountaintop was a cross painted in yellow and blue, the flag's colors, and other kinds of Ukrainian paraphernalia.

I got a couple sandwiches out of my backpack and took a snack break, waiting for everyone to turn up. It took about 40 minutes for the group to arrive. As soon as everyone got there, the tour guide took us through a bit of history of the region and it's people, the nearby mountains and their first ascenders.

Once everyone was ready to go, the descend began. But that's a whole different story.