Ukraine Weather, climate and geography

Weather and climate

Best time to visit

Ukraine has a temperate continental climate with cold, snowy winters and warm summers. Summer is generally the best time to visit (between June and September), although it can occasionally be uncomfortably hot and many hotels do not have air conditioning. July and August are peak holiday months in Crimea and its resorts can become crowded with domestic and Russian tourists. Spring and autumn are both fairly short and both tend to be reasonably mild. The best season for trekking in the Carpathian Mountains is May and October when it is driest.

The northeast of Ukraine has the coldest winters and the Crimean peninsula has the warmest temperatures. The wettest part of Ukraine is the Carpathian Mountains region of the far west.

Required clothing

Lightweight clothes needed in summer, light- to mediumweight in the spring and autumn and heavyweight in the winter.

Geography

Ukraine is bordered by the Russian Federation to the north and east; Belarus to the north; Poland, the Slovak Republic and Hungary to the west; and Romania and Moldova to the southwest. It is a varied country with mountains in the west, plains in the centre and the Black Sea views to the south. The north of the state is dominated by forests. Its other two main features are wooded steppe with beech and oak forests and the treeless steppe. The River Dnieper divides Ukraine roughly in half, and flows into the Black Sea.