Mount Kuk

Kuk is a mountain in the south-eastern part of the Polonyna Borzhava massif in Zakarpattia Oblast. It stands south-west of Mizhhiria and south of the village of Lysychovo. It is 1361 m high and one of the Borzhava peaks closest to Mizhhiria.

Up to 1200–1250 m the mountain is covered with beech forest with scattered spruce and fir; higher up lie meadows with blueberry. The north-eastern slopes are very steep and hard to cross. From the summit the massif runs north to the neighbouring Polonyna Kuk (1190 m). The panorama from Kuk is one of the widest in the region: to the north-west you see Stii and Velykyi Verkh, to the north and east the Gorgany, to the south-east Polonyna Krasna, and on clear days Svydovets, the Maramureș Mountains and the mountains of Romania on the horizon.

How to get there

A blue-marked path leads over the summit to the village of Nyzhnii Bystryi. It continues the red-marked Transcarpathian Tourist Trail, which follows the Borzhava crest from Volovets. On our site Kuk is part of long traverses: Vovchyi – Stii – Zhyd-Mahura – Pryslip pass – Polonyna Kuk – Koryshche – Shyroke – Nyzhnii Bystryi (60.7 km) and Kushnytsia – Polonyna Kuk – Shyrokyi Verkh – Zhyd-Mahura – Velykyi Verkh – Plai – Volovets (47.1 km). These are multi-day routes, so plan your overnight stops in advance.

Water, shelter and safety

Our map shows a hut on Polonyna Kuk about 1.9 km from the summit. There are few springs on the crest, so carry water. The weather changes quickly on open meadows: it is easy to lose the path in fog, and a thunderstorm on a treeless ridge is dangerous. The best season is from May to October. In an emergency call 112 or 101; contacts of the nearest units are on the mountain rescue page.

Interesting facts

• The writer Vasyl Grendzha-Donskyi, a native of Mizhhiria, wrote: “To be in the Carpathians and not visit Mount Kuk is like being in Rome and not seeing the Pope.” Here he met the outlaw Ilko Lypei, hero of his novella of the same name.
• The Richanskyi zoological reserve lies south of the mountain; the Koziai stream rises on its eastern slopes and the Vaskova river on the western ones.
• From 1912 a 21 km forest narrow-gauge railway ran to the virgin forests below Polonyna Kuk; it was dismantled in 1990.

Photos: EugeneB, CC BY-SA 3.0; Boryviterixvi, CC BY-SA 4.0; Boryviterixvi, CC BY-SA 4.0; Boryviterixvi, CC BY-SA 4.0 — Wikimedia Commons.