Fly Aerosvit Kiev to JFK
I have to take care of some business back home, so I returned to the U.S. on Saturday. I flew on Aerosvit Flight 131 from Kiev, Borispol Aeroport to New York’s JFK airport. Aerosvit flies direct from Kiev to JFK five days a week. I booked the flight a few weeks ago on expedia.com. I think the one-way ticket cost about 659 dollars with taxes.
As you can see on the map, it is a long way from Kiev to New York. The route goes over Poland, Germany, Great Britain, Ireland, the North Atlantic Ocean, Newfoundland, Nova Scotia and New England.
To get to Borispol Aeroport in Kiev, I took the metro from Sports Palace to Kharkivska station. There is a bus operated by ATASS that stops just before the bridge. Cost is 20 Hryvnia. A taxi from the downtown center would be about 200 Hryvnia, I was told. The only problem is the metro in Kiev gets very crowded. On Saturday I wasn’t expecting a big crowd, but there was one anyway. For some reason there were even more people than on a weekday!
We checked our bags and went through passport control. Mistake. There are no money exchanges inside. We should have converted Ukrainian Hryvnia to dollars before going through passport control.
My flight left Kiev at 1 PM and was nonstop. Boeing 767 jumbo jet. We arrived in New York at 4.30PM. The whole flight took just over 10 hours, but there is a 7-hour timezone change. It is pretty cool to leave Kiev at 1 PM and arrive in NY only 3-1/2 hours later by the clock and sun.
To pass the time on the flight they showed a couple of movies including The Chronicles of Narnia: Price Caspian and Wall-E. They also served us two full meals. All-in-all excellent service on Aerosvit. I will fly Aerosvit again.
When I got off the plane at JFK we first had to go through passport control. Long line but it moved quickly. There are three lines: one for U.S. citizens, one for permanent residents (green-card holders), and one for visitors. Just make sure you get on the right line, which for me was the right line.
We waited a little bit for the luggage to come down the carousel. Bags arrived safely in short order. I notice a lot of bags were wrapped in plastic or in plastic bags. Aerosvit recommends wrapping bags in either plastic or cloth to get through baggage handling easier. After picking up our bags we passed through customs. The customs guy asks how long you were gone? Anything to declare? We had nothing to declare. OK.
Right outside of customs is a money exchange. I needed U.S. dollars so I exchanged 20 Euros and got $22.50. Rip off! Official exchange rate is $1.41 per euro so $28.20. Exchange as little money as possible at the airport. Lesson: Always carry some euros and some U.S. dollars with you when traveling.
Next I found my way to the airport train that loops around the airport, called the AIRTRAIN. It’s free to get from terminal to terminal. But to exit at Howard Beach and get on the subway to Manhattan costs $7.25, including the subway fare..
Then like Duke Ellington, I “Take the A-Train” to Penn Station which is at 34th Street and 8th Avenue in mid-town Manhattan where I will spend a few days. The A-train goes through Brooklyn and up lower Manhattan. It’s a long subway ride, which takes about one hour from Howard Beach to Penn Station. Fortunately I had a seat in the corner with my four bags.
Finally I walked to my hostel on 30th Street and checked in. The very first thing I did after dropping off my bags was to go out and get a slice of New York pizza at Pizza Sumprema. I checked my watched and it was 7:30 PM in the evening. From touchdown at JFK to pizza took 3 hours.
I haven’t been “Back in the USSA” in about a year and a half. I hear there is a new President. I do look forward to visiting the big apple because there is always exciting events happening. Everywhere you point a camera finds something interesting. Plus I will be able to sample some of the great street food in New York like the famous New York style pizza, hot dogs and knishes. I may also visit the Carnegie Deli for one of their giant pastrami sandwiches, the kind that makes slim French people roll their eyes.
And don’t forget breakfast at the Stage Door Deli. I’ll stop in and visit with the waitresses from Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan and Bulgaria that work there. When I was leaving the U.S. back in March 2008, the waitress from Bulgarian told me I should visit Bulgaria. I wasn’t planning on going to Bulgaria this trip, but I ended up spending about four months in Bulgaria, including the entire winter!