Lutsk announced its tourism ambitions several months ago when Lina Ostapchuk, the leading specialist of the department of international cooperation and tourism at the Lviv City Council, came back from the Great Festival Workshop that took place in Kamianets-Podilsky.
Her colleague and she were presenting in Kamianets-Podilsky the concept of launching the tourism season in Lutsk, and their project won in the competition of the projects.
The example of Kamianets-Podilsky, which has even a castle resembling the one in Lutsk and has been making money on its tourism attractiveness, has also become the source of inspiration for the city authorities.
For there is not only rich and interesting heritage that Lutsk can use, but also the fact that it is located on the halfway between two capitals, Kyiv and Warsaw. Souvenir production with Lutsk’s presentation logotype appeared several months later, the mayor held a meeting with all who contributes to the city’s tourism branch, a tourism website was launched, and tourist calendar and reference book Lutsk. Pleasant Discovery has been published.
The plans also include placing presentation banners and road signs giving direction to monuments of history and culture, like those established in Lviv (which were developed, by the way, by scholars from the Volyn-based Lesia Ukrainka National University).
The special appeal of the tourism season newly launched in Lutsk, in my opinion, is the sightseeing tours held by the experts of the city’s history and culture, from the local history researcher, author of the book Streets of Lutsk Valdemar Piasetsky and well-known historian, head of the cultural heritage protection department at the Lutsk City Council Serhii Hodlevsky to US Peace Corps volunteer Terry Mattison and soloist of the Lutsk band Fiolet Serhii Martyniuk. Whereas Terry provided information about the city in English, Serhii guided a tour via, so to say, informal Lutsk.
Even for me, a long-time resident of Lutsk, the story of the elephant sculpture nearly in the heart of the city came as a revelation.
This elephant used to be painted in different colors, blue, gold, rosy, and even orange. I found out that formerly it was accompanied by dog Moska from Krylov’s fable. I remember Lesia Ukrainka Street, which is currently a pedestrian street, since the time route buses were going along it. Now it is surprising to think that there used to be two-way traffic on this road. Piasetsky explained that there used to be 10 hotels in this street, a Turkish coffee shop, and the street has changed its title over 10 times.
Serhii HODLEVSKY, a guide of the tours across the Old Town:
“We underestimate Lutsk’s significance for the world, Ukrainian history, and the history of how our mentality was shaped. I think that the city is of Kyiv’s age. But in order to prove this you need to conduct a research. Lutsk has always been tolerant to people of various nationalities; it was even a venue of the meeting of European monarchs and a winter capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The scarce knowledge of our history impoverishes us and lowers our self-esteem. Therefore I think that the fact that tourism ambitions have finally ‘woken up’ in Lutsk will draw the attention of the people living here.”
