Part one of the bet-a-pot's Countdown to Busto Euro trip is over.

First stop was in Yalta, Ukraine where I travelled with bunch of friends to play Betfair LIVE! Yalta $900 main event.

Yalta, titled as "Crimean Riviera", is a beautiful semi-soviet place in the Northern coast of the Black Sea.

To get to Yalta, you have to take a flight to Simferopol (86 kilometers from Yalta), and take a taxi (approx. $65) or a bus (approx. $3) to Yalta. Best way to get to Simferopol is via Borispol airport (Kiev).

In June 2009, Ukranian government closed all casinos and gambling is illegal. There are places to play poker, though. Poker Clubs are popular in Kiev, and there are also a few in Yalta, too.

If you're playing poker, best way to stay in Yalta is to book a room from Yalta Intourist hotel during the high season (summer), which accommodates one of the clubs, Cadillac Poker Club in the basement floor.

Yalta_1

Yalta is a great place for a group of players to go on a poker vacation. Vodka is very cheap (around €12 / bottle including mixers, and there are loads of places that serve shisha and drinks / sushi / food around the beach. If you're into hitting on girls, study and learn few words in Russian before the trip, because only a few Ukranian (at least Crimean) speak English very well.

Although there are lots of tourists, Yalta is not the place where people hassle around you and try to sell you something all the time, actually you can walk 1,5 kilometers in Yalta beach promenade without anyone trying to hustle you in any way.

High season is the way to go if you are in to cash games, and the limits go all the way up to $5/$10 (PLO) and $10/$25 (NLHE).

There are many great tournament weeks (ie. Russian Poker Series) in Ukraine (Kiev, Odessa, Yalta etc.) that are definitely worth a visit.

Attached some pictures from the trip, see the thumbnails in the right hand side. Picture on the right is from my Yalta Intourist junior suite balcony. Next week I'm off to Prague to play the Unibet Open main event.

Talk to you laters!