The main route into Ukraine from the West is via Poland - the only 24-hour customs post is in Lvivska Oblast (Region) at a place called Krakovets. The nearest significant town on the Polish side is Przemysl, and it's straightforward to find by following route #4 (which passes through Przemysl). When you arrive at the border, the road is fairly narrow (no motorway/autobahn), and there is always a queue of trucks and vans parked to the right of the road. Don't park behind the goods vehicles, slip up the side of them and then feed into the customs area when the guy flags you forward (for courteous Europeans, you're not jumping the queue as commercial traffic goes through a different process). If you're in an EU-registered car then find the EU-passports section. Then, proceed to Ukrainian passport control and then Ukrainian customs and you're through. It used to be a nightmare, with apocryphal tales of 5-6+ hours at the border, but the Ukrainians have made great advances in efficiency with a 1-2 hour border crossing now possible.
Once through, just follow the main road towards Lviv (Львів) on the E40 - this is the route right across Ukraine to Kiev (and thence the East). Stick to this - the main towns on the way are Lviv, Rivne (Рівне), Zhytomyr (Житомир). Care is required as the road still remains in a miserable condition, even though it is the main East/West highway and the main road route from and to the EU.
The Most Frequently Asked Travel Questions about Kiev
Where To Stay & Best Hotels in Kiev - updated May 2024
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Kiev Travel Guide from Wikitravel. Many thanks to all Wikitravel contributors. Text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0, images are available under various licenses, see each image for details.
