Ukrainian visa requirements for australians

[rialannah]

We are two Australians who will be travelling on Azamara Journey in the Black Sea in May 2013. We have extensive travel experience in Europe and this will be our 4th cruise in the area.

 

We call at Odessa, Sevastopol and Yalta. We are taking privately arranged tours in each port - i.e. we will not be taking the ship's shore excursions.

 

We are well aware that Australians travelling to the Ukraine generally require a visa (although US, UK and Canadian travellers do not.) There is reference on these Boards to cruise ship passengers not requiring a visa, including quoting of a government regulation to that effect by Altiva.

 

I have spoken with the Consular section of the Ukrainian Embassy in Canberra, however they seem to specially trained to be unhelpful. My travel agent has had no greater success with the cruise line.

 

I am hoping that there are Australian cruisers who have recent experience in Black Sea ports and who used private excursions and can provide some reliable evidence about whether or not they were required to hold a visa.

[hkto]

http://www.tripadvisor.ca/ShowTopic-g295368-i5302-k5103395-Do_you_need_a_visa_to_leave_cruise_ship-Odessa_Odessa_Oblast.html

[altiva]

We are two Australians who will be travelling on Azamara Journey in the Black Sea in May 2013. We have extensive travel experience in Europe and this will be our 4th cruise in the area.

 

We call at Odessa, Sevastopol and Yalta. We are taking privately arranged tours in each port - i.e. we will not be taking the ship's shore excursions.

 

We are well aware that Australians travelling to the Ukraine generally require a visa (although US, UK and Canadian travellers do not.) There is reference on these Boards to cruise ship passengers not requiring a visa, including quoting of a government regulation to that effect by Altiva.

 

I have spoken with the Consular section of the Ukrainian Embassy in Canberra, however they seem to specially trained to be unhelpful. My travel agent has had no greater success with the cruise line.

 

I am hoping that there are Australian cruisers who have recent experience in Black Sea ports and who used private excursions and can provide some reliable evidence about whether or not they were required to hold a visa.

 

Hi rialannah,

I am glad to see that you read my post.

The Ukrainian embassy might have been unhelpful because you continued to call Ukraine "the Ukraine". Surely calling a country -

a province would not get you any browny points. It's a really offensive name, and coming from the country, which has the second

largest Ukrainian diaspora in the world, it sounds really bad. If you want Ukrainians and their embassy to be nice to you, drop the "the".

Then, there is an issue of Australia refusing point blank to open an embassy in Kyiv, Ukraine. I understand that you have nothing to do

with this, personally. But, coupled with "the Ukraine", it just sends the wrong signal. Kind of "yes, I agree that your country is

not a country, and we don't deign to open an embassy in this "the" what not thing".

I assure you again, that if you arrive by a cruise ship, you don't need a visa. You can get off you ship and do whatever, any tour,

private or not, or take no tour at all, for 48 hours. The only thing is, if your ship stays the night, you must come back to it to sleep.

You can't stay on shore and check in a hotel. I hope that you will have a wonderful cruise and come to appreciate Ukraine and Ukrainian

people for what they are.

[altiva]

Also, I forgot to tell you that there is a guy here, called Rico. He posted a fantastic report on his cruise, with photos. He is from Brazilia. Brazilians need a visa to enter Ukraine also, unless they come on a cruise ship. You can talk to him for reassurance.

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1785542&highlight=ukrain

[rialannah]

Thank you for your responses. I am now satisfied that as Australians we do not require Ukraine visas so long as we are only onshore during the day.

 

hkto - I had previously interrogated Tripadvisor, but missed that thread. It was extremely helpful.

 

Altiva - thank you for your response. I can assure you that the attitude of the consular official was not related to my approach. He absolutely denied that there were any special arrangements for cruise ship passengers and that we would require visas.

[altiva]

Thank you for your responses. I am now satisfied that as Australians we do not require Ukraine visas so long as we are only onshore during the day.

 

hkto - I had previously interrogated Tripadvisor, but missed that thread. It was extremely helpful.

 

Altiva - thank you for your response. I can assure you that the attitude of the consular official was not related to my approach. He absolutely denied that there were any special arrangements for cruise ship passengers and that we would require visas.

 

hi rialannah, sorry to hear about that. I think that he is require to iussue a certain amount of visas and to collect a certain amount of cash for them per month, that is why he told you this.

[vaflyboi]

Hi Rialannah - we are an Aussie family doing much the same cruise in a few weeks as you did and also have come across the same issue!

 

How did you go?

 

Any info would be greatly appreciated.

 

Hope you had a great time!

 

Cheers.

[roaming_kiwi58]

vaflyboi - I notice you haven't had a response to your query, so I will pass on our recent experience. We are NZers. Like Australians we normally need a visa to visit Ukraine. We did a Black Sea cruise with Azamara last month. I received conflicting information about the Ukraine visa situation for people on cruises before we left home, so I booked shore excursions in Yalta, Sevastopol and Odessa, to make sure we saw something of these places, though we would have been happy to do at least Odessa on our own. We were told to carry our passports with us all the time in case we were asked for them, but there was only one occasion in the whole 3 days in Ukraine ports when we required them That was when we reached the first port, Yalta. There was an official sitting on the boat, as we went to the gangway to get off. We had to wave our passport under his nose, open at the information page. He really had no time to check anything, other than the fact we had a passport! It was a token gesture! So we went ashore to wander these towns on our own in addition to doing our booked shore excursions. At no other time did we get asked for passports/visas or any ID while in Ukraine.

Hope that helps.