Ukraine's Podillia is a gently rolling country of black soil, but along its southwestern edge a line of strange ridges rises out of the fields, and Satanivska Dacha lies among them. The ridges are the Tovtry, a belt of low hills made from fossil reefs, remains of a barrier reef that grew in the warm shallow sea that covered the region some twenty million years ago, in the Miocene. The rock is limestone studded with shells and corals, and the ridge runs for hundreds of kilometres, a landscape unlike anything else in eastern Europe. The area is protected as part of the Podilski Tovtry National Nature Park.
The Zbruch, a small river with a deep valley, formed the border between the Austrian and Russian empires in the nineteenth century, and it was here that a remarkable stone idol, a four-faced pillar called the Zbruch Idol, was found in 1848, a relic of pre-Christian Slavic belief that is now in a museum in Krakow.
The nearest town of any size is Husiatyn, on the Zbruch, a small place with an old fortress-synagogue and a ruined castle, with some fuel and food. The riding is gentle and rural, along roads that pass through villages with whitewashed cottages, orchards and sunflowers, and many surfaces are rough, with potholes and patches. Fuel stations are scattered, so top up where you can. The war in Ukraine has changed everything about travel, and conditions can vary, so check the current situation carefully before planning anything.
In peacetime, the best season is late spring, when the fields are green and the orchards in bloom, or early autumn, when the beech woods turn gold. Summers are warm and thundery. Winters are cold with deep snow.
The local food is robust and generous: borshch, varenyky dumplings with cherries or potatoes, and honey. Hospitality in village homes is legendary, and a cup of tea turns into a feast.