Ukrainian castles. A public holiday, so we pile into a car and head off to visit some castles. This is a type of structure rare in most of the Former Soviet Union, but western Ukraine is full of them. We visit Zolochiv, Pidhirtsi and Olesko, all within a few kilometres of each other. Zolochiv is another reminder of Ukraine's tumultuous history: built in the 17thC for the father of a future king of Poland, it was later seized by Turks; attacked by Tatars; fell into disuse; then in the 20thC was used as a prison by the Soviet "Commissariat of Internal Affairs", after 1939; by the Gestapo, from 1941; and then the Commissariat of Internal Affairs again. Plaques mark the tragic deaths of those who died there. Pidhirtsi, a more cheerful looking place, is undergoing a massive restoration; while Olesko, the most ancient of the three (13thC), was the birthplace (in 1629) of the Polish king Jan III Sobieski, later famed for feats of arms against the Swedes, the Russians and, again, the Turks. The Battle of Vienna in 1683, when he led the combined Polish-Austrian-German forces, marked a turning point in the struggle between the central European powers and the Ottoman Empire. It's also supposed to have led to the introduction of the coffee bean to western Europe. Someone once said Europe will never be united until western Europeans understand Eastern European history. There is much to learn.