This vlog follows travel creators Kara and Nate Buchanan spending a day in Lviv, Ukraine to show what roughly $100 can buy. They withdraw 2,500 (UAH/rivna) from an ATM and use it across experiences: an unlimited breakfast buffet at Bakzewski ($6 per person), climbing the town-hall clock tower (≈$1.50 each), buying handmade chocolates (16 truffles and a bar for under $10), a theatrical coffee experience at the Lviv Coffee Mining Manufacturer (flaming coffee for $3), riding old trams (≈2.20 each) to a large historic cemetery, visiting the Beer Cultural Experience Center (entrance 75 rivna each; beer tasting under $2 for four beers), grocery-price glimpses, and a dinner described as $21 for food and drinks. The video emphasizes Lviv's high value-for-money for travelers and mixes practical prices with experiential commentary.
Questions this video answers
2,500 (UAH/rivna) pulled from the ATM.
$6 per person.
Approximately $1.50 per person.
$10 budget.
16 handmade truffles and an additional bar of chocolate for less than $10 (200 rivna reported).
Chapters
I need that.
If you're new here. We are. Kara and Nate. We're currently traveling through our 94th country of Ukraine. We had no idea Come to Ukraine.
Thank you.
We started in the capital city of Kiev.
Is that enough?
Spent two days exploring the Chernobyl exclusion zone. And in our last video, we took an overnight train to the beautiful city of LV.
After traveling around Ukraine for over two weeks. One of our favorite things about this country is the insane value that it offers for travelers. Sure, there are other places in the world that we've been to that are cheaper, but those places feel. Feel like they should be cheaper.
Like, when you're sitting on the side of the road on a plastic bench and you see the rats running around in the kitchen, that big bowl of noodles feels like it should cost only a dollar. We are not knocking Asian street food. It's one of our favorite things in the world. Point we're trying to make here is that it's just a different kind of cheap.
We thought the best way to illustrate the value that we've been getting here in Ukraine was to show you what you could get for a hundred dollars in one day. So we got 2, 500 out of the ATM, and we're gonna start with breakfast.
Nate's favorite.
This restaurant is called Bakzewski, and it is an unlimited breakfast buffet.
It's so pretty.
This is amazing.
This is, without a doubt, the most beautiful breakfast buffet I've ever been to. And the room itself is just gorgeous. And there's a guy playing the piano, and the champagne is included in the buffet. I'm cracking up at Nate and I's differences. My plate is all, like, cheese and veggies and, like, savory. And Nate went with fall sweets and, like, cakey things. He basically got dessert with some bacon. And in addition to the buffet, they make you a fresh omelette. This is my kind of omelette.
Okay, so for an unlimited breakfast buffet with coffee, with a glass of champagne, guess how much it costs per person.
$6 per person for all of this. That's crazy.
So what time do you want to come tomorrow, Nate?
Next up, we've come to the very middle of the city, to town hall. We are going to work off our brunch by climbing to the very tippy top of the clock tower.
The staircase has gotten much, much smaller.
Oh, we made it. $1.50 each.
My whole body just came off the ground.
That was so funny.
Impressively loud.
So one of the reasons we were convinced to come to Lviv it's because we've heard it is referred to as the city of coffee and chocolate. So.
This place is like heaven. It smells so good in here. I can already feel myself losing all my self control. But Nate has given me a $10 budget to spend here. Challenge accepted. I don't even know where to start. I'm overwhelmed with decision.
This is the rated R chocolate. I don't want to get demonetized. Oh, the dark. Oh, okay. I'll try one of those.
This one. I'll try this one too.
Wow.
That was really fun. Box 200 Rivas. You will pay at next haul. Thank you so much. I was two rivnas under budget for all of this. Handmade chocolate.
16 beautiful handmade truffles, a whole nother bar of chocolate, all for less than $10.
This is like a little cappuccino.
Mmm.
Do I pick them out? Well.
Next up, we are heading to a coffee shop. And if what I've read online is true, this will be the most interesting coffee shop that we've ever been to.
Is that not the most beautiful sight you've ever seen? And the smell. I wish. I wish I could share the smell with you. Like, it is just so strong. Like, as soon as you walk in the door, just.
I could stay here the rest of the day. Could this taste any better? We just came from a chocolate shop straight to a coffee shop.
So on the surface, it just looks like a really cool coffee shop. But I'm pretty sure it gets better.
Down, down into the.
I feel like we are not supposed to go down here.
Give it a try.
Thank you. I put it on. I got a construction hat from this nice man.
I think he said, go in this way.
Where are we?
You walk in, a guy gives you a hard hat, and then he literally just points. And we still have no clue what's happening.
Literally no one has paid any attention to us.
It's called the Lviv Coffee mining manufacturer. And I guess it's living up to the name. There's like, a series of caves underneath the coffee shop.
They give you hard hats for a reason. Hit my head on this door coming in.
What? Just.
We'll take two, please.
I don't even know what they're called. Two of the ones with fire, please.
Ready?
He got me.
W.
Because that was very hot.
That was awesome. And I cannot believe that that is allowed.
Right in front of my face. No warning. He's just like, move your phone.
It's amazing.
It's like a creamy, strong cappuccino with crunchy singed sugar on top. We have no clue how.
Thank you.
Wow. $3 for a flaming coffee.
I'll say.
I did a bunch of research on this day, and I was excited about it, but everything has been way better than I expected.
$2 because I like the accordion. Is that an accordion? Is that what that thing's called?
So many street performers in La Vie. I love it.
I don't know how much it's gonna cost. That's all the money. Have fun.
Okay. So I rarely get my nails done, but since we've been in Ukraine, I feel like I've really noticed a lot of the women here value beauty a lot, like hair, makeup, clothes, always super, super cute. And they all have these beautiful manicures. So.
They had no appointments for the next three days. How crazy is that? So I need to find a new nail place or I'm not getting my nails done. That was actually my third attempt, and it's in this weird, like, upstairs area. I don't know if I'm getting my nails done today. I honestly don't even know where I am anymore. Nate is usually the maps guy. Maybe I'll do some shopping.
Hey, I don't think I'm getting my nails done today. Also, can you send me our address? I. I'm kind of lost.
So the number five thing to do in Lviv is visit a cemetery, which sounds kind of weird, but it does give us an excuse to get outside of the city center and ride one of these really old trams. So we're going to head there now.
According to Google Maps, we are waiting on tram number one.
For 2.20cents to ride as far as you want to.
Fun.
All right, so a few interesting facts. It costs about A$50 to get in. It was started in the 1700s. Over 300,000 people are buried here, and it is the largest cemetery in Ukraine.
And probably the most beautiful we've ever seen. Some of the tombstones are massive. Like, they're like a whole house. Like, bigger than the house that we slept in in Switzerland.
They really take their tombstone seriously here. We don't make it a point of going to cemeteries during our travels. But when they're number five on Trip.
Advisor, it's a really nice place to walk around. Super quiet.
We just rode about 25 minutes across town, and it cost 66 rivna.
We just paid 75 rivna each to enter the Beer Cultural Experience Center. I think it's kind of like a beer museum.
Museum.
Museum.
I never wanted to say that word correctly.
Beer was first mentioned in the ancient sumer. Who doesn't love a cold beer in the hot sumer?
Boo.
So we just learned about the history of beer pretty much since the beginning of time. And apparently, they used to always drink beer out of straws originally, but then they realized that that was really bad for the environment, so the assyrians started filtering it finally. I'm just joking.
So the tasting wasn't included in the ticket price, but it was less than $2. It included four beers, which I thought it was gonna be, like, a sip of four beers, but that's like, four full beers for less than $2. So we thought we'd try all eight. Now we have way too much beer.
Okay, so we don't need anything in the grocery store, and I'm probably gonna get geeked out for filming in here, But I wanted to show you how affordable everything is in here. A whole loaf of bread, half a watermelon, a dozen eggs over a l.
Darn it.
She caught me. There is an entire aisle of bottles of vodka that are so cheap, it's crazy in a tiny grocery store.
For our last stop of the night, we are heading to dinner at what one vlog called the most visited restaurant in all of Europe.
We are just as skeptical as you.
Are, especially considering it requires a password.
There's a huge line. It's not so secret. People are just rolling out of here.
No photo. No photo. And not in the restauran time. No, it's too secret. He wouldn't let us bring the camera in.
He was serious.
Did you get the password right?
I was just like.
I knew it started with a g, and the sideways started with an s. I said, green as lava, but I don't know if that was right.
And he was like.
And then he saw Nate, and he.
Went, no, you got to close the door real fast.
That was crazy.
Okay, plan B.
So, like, I want to eat there.
I don't know what that is, but.
Yeah, we wouldn't be able to.
It's quite the experience, let me tell you. They may march some prisoners by you and shoot them. You have to declare glory to Ukraine to get in.
Yeah. We were literally walking away when those people came out raving about their experience.
He was like, best experience ever, so.
And now we have to go.
Taking the camera back to the apartment.
Sorry, we have to go.
First. We were greeted by the same angry man holding a gun who asked for the secret password. And then once we got in, he poured us a mystery shot out of an army canteen and made us drink it.
Before we went downstairs, there were four cups. I'm pretty sure everybody in the restaurant uses the same four cups.
I don't want to think about that. We had a great time.
Dinner and drinks was $21, which I'm pretty sure brings our daily total to like, roughly three. We were trying to spend money.
Long story short, you get incredible value for your money in Lviv.
It's like a beautiful, flowy chocolate waterfall.
It's literally coming out of the wall. Don't worry.
