Conclusion
Going to the Ukraine was something I needed to do.  I had to see firsthand what this was all about or I would have always wondered what I missed.  I am very happy with the trip overall, I was given a chance to meet an outstanding woman and I made the choice not to follow through.  
Recommendations and Opinions
Whenever I had down time I listened at length to the other guys stories as they unfolded.  I learned a tremendous amount by just being a fly on the wall during these discussions and I have drawn many conclusions.  Here are some of my conclusions.  
1.   If you are older i.e. late forties and up, than forget about the 23 and under girls.  I heard and witnessed a lot of these older men going on dates with the ultra-young girls and not one turned out successful by any measure.  The guys got taken for the food for the date and interpreter, $10 an hour for interpreter services + whatever they bought the date, which in many cases was substantial.  In many cases these guys did not even realize they were being taken.  I quite gently suggested that they rethink the circumstances of their date but most guys were in fantasyland.  
2.   Letter writing through Anastasia is a scam.  The ladies are not writing the letters.  Ladies that had been corresponding to the guys for a period of months and up to a year mysteriously were out of town, sick, or unable to even meet the man they had been corresponding with.  They was the case with at least 12 of the guys I spoke with.  The guys were writing to either a fat Ukrainian man in his underware giggling by the computer or more likely one of the lovely young female tour guides that helped us throughout the trip.  If you are currently writing to an Anastasia girl than don’t assume it is really her.  It maybe is real but it could be a scam.  Today, as I am writing this trip report, I received a letter from a lady that I did meet on the trip and there was absolutely no interest on her end, yet I just got a letter from her.  If I open it, it will cost me $8 dollars.  I know for damn near a fact she could not have written it because she expressed zero interest in me in our conversation.   My opinion is your our better off going on this trip blind than corresponding since the correspondence is phony.  
3.   Of the 40 or so men on the trip I would say about 8 were talking in terms of fiancé visas and several had proposed and even given a ring to their girl.  By the airplane ride back to Austria and than to the states a couple of them were wondering a bit about their relationship.  In the end I do believe there were a few couples that will be married and maybe even make a success of it and those were the ones where the age difference was not too tremendous, i.e.  50 and 33, or 35 and 21.  

Final thoughts

Overall the trip was very good for me although some of the marketing techniques of Anastasia are very suspect.  On a positive note for Anastasia their socials were full of girls and the staff was very good.  They did put us in an excellent hotel and were generally helpful while I was in their hands.  The men on the trip varied from age 27-68.  Some of the guys could have been cast in Revenge of the Nerds and others were very competent and handsome men of varying ages.  Without exception the guys that took the trip were decent and fairly good intentioned as far as I could tell.  

I am all done, I have told the truth the way I saw it now if you have anything more you want to know than let me know.  There is much more to say but I have probably blabbed on too much already.  

... in response to trip report part 3, posted by fathertime on Apr 13, 2005

You got that right, most of the girls on that site, are not the girls writing the letters to the men. when I used them, out of say 12 girls, only one I met when I got to the city, like you said, most were mysteriously... out of town or moved away, and the one I did met, had never seen my photo, but whoever wrote her letters, sent her address and phone #, and I had my translator call her and set up a meeting. She had no idea who I was, but agreed to meet us anyways. So don’t waste your money using their services.

... in response to trip report part 3, posted by fathertime on Apr 13, 2005

That was a good trip report, Fathertime. I have been on the scene for a while now, and I agree with your observations. For me, the golden rule is to get the personal contact details (phone and postal address) of the girl, at the earliest opportunity. Any agency which refuses to give this info is almost certainly "on the rob." And try to stick to the free personal ads wherever the opportunity arises. After a while you can simply get to smell when things are not right.

I used this principle a few months back to smell out a scammer, but this one was wily enough to give me a home address which might have been enough to convince me once, especially as the street actually did exist; however, I did some homework and discovered that the address was nonexistent, the house numbers stopped at least 30 short of the one she gave me, and it wasn't even a residential area. By this time I was being asked to send money for "her" passage to come meet me, and even gave me the name of the local Travel Agency where the application for visa etc was made (again genuine) but they knew nothing about "her." So the scammers are becoming more subtle, by introducing an element of truth (genuine street names, etc) to try to throw us off the scent.

About the age gap, even though I had a VERY successful meeting in Ukraine with a 26 year old (I am 46) and she has kept in regular contact, phoned me from Dnepropetrovsk on my birthday and urgently wants to me get back there soon, and did not try to rob me, I would generally agree about the 15 year limit.

I was also quite surprised that you went on an Anastassia Tour, I presume you have read the feedback from this board about "Socials." Apart from the unscrupulous way that the tours often seem to be conducted, they are also "on the rob." I made my recent trip alone, organised it all myself, and got 7 days including Nikolaev and Dnepropetrovsk for a total of 700 UK pounds (about 1.3k USD) including flights, apartments (not hotels) and spending money. This indicates that they must be making at least 2.5k profit per person per trip. PEOPLE, DON'T WASTE YOUR TIME AND MONEY! It's really not that difficult to organise on your own, and most of the help they are offering is not in your best interest anyway, so you simply don't need it.

... in response to trip report part 3, posted by fathertime on Apr 13, 2005

Why don't you try posting your miserable experience on paid advertising "guide" boards and see how quickly it gets you banned.  Then you will learn a truth about "the industry" and discussion boards.

... in response to was NOT a miserable experience, posted by fathertime on Apr 14, 2005

They should be in your in box by now.  I look forward to laughing at the reaction on at least one of the boards.

... in response to Re: emailed to you, posted by fathertime on Apr 14, 2005

I too would love to see the response from that one particular company sponsored, moderator laden, "guide" board.