Lithuania is where?
Sunday, September 14th, 2008The Baltic’s definitely have a different feel to them from the rest of Eastern Europe, but still similar in that there is an old town with a lot of nice buildings and old churches…which by now I may be getting sick of. It does seem more western and less soviet influenced as you go through the three Baltic states, especially Estonia which tries to align itself with the Nordic countries rater than Eastern Europe.
Myself, Hal, Tom and Joe of the bus all headed to our Vilnius hostel, a nice place just on the edge of the old town. We were all pretty tired from our overnight bus so had a bit of a power nap then joined up with Magada, also from our bus, a Polish chick in Vilnius for the weekend. We all headed back to the back station to get the 30minute bus to this town with a castle. We slept for the short journey then got it together to go find the castle. The town was on this narrow strip of land that was surrounded by water with the castle at the end. We walked along the one road, it was a nice place, nothing too special though. Eventually we found the castle which is on an island in the middle of the lake. It had been completely rebuilt after being all old and falling down so was kind of flash and new looking. It was ok, more a nice spot than an amazing castle.
We got bored kind of quickly and went and negotiated a row bow boat to hire off this old man. Somehow we all managed to fit in and spent the next hour rowing around the lake and somehow getting stuck in this big rowing race going on…we made it out after getting told off by a security boat. We decided that we better go for a swim, not that anyone else was but seemed like a good idea so rowed into the middle of the lake to jump in…it was refreshing to say the least but nice to get in the water and probably the last day warm enough to actually go swimming! Definitely not as warm as the Mediterranean where I last was swimming but nice. We walked around the stalls along the lake to dry off a bit and checked out some crazy Russian fighter pilot hats which Tom ended up getting one, complete with a soviet badge that the guy kept hidden away as they’re illegal to sell. We grabbed some supermarket food and had a late lunch by the water before heading back on the bus to Vilnius, a good day in the sun.
We cooked a massive dinner at the hostel and had a few drinks before checking out the town which was having some big festival, the music on the main stage had finished by the time we got there and clubs and stupid expensive cover charges so we ended up sitting on the steps of the main square talking to a whole bunch of Lithuanians for ages before we finally headed home and into bed around 5am. Needless to say we all slept in late the next day.
Hal and Tom left the next morning (or afternoon actually) and eventually me, Magada and Joe got out of the hostel and wandered around, seeing more weddings and churches and the old university.
We grabbed some dinner with a couple of others at a close by traditional food restaurant, nice and cheap with very filling unhealthy type meals. The festival was still running so we went down an checked it out, making it in time to see one of the bands playing, again lots of people around but everyone was kind of tired so ended up back at the hostel early-ish.
My final day in the city I went out with Magada, Joe and an Irish guy and we went and climbed up an old tower to get a view of the city then went out to this district of the city which declared itself independent of Lithuania awhile back and came up with a crazy constitution with things like “A dog has a right to be a dog”, and “everyone has the right to make mistakes”.
We ended up seeing a few others from our hostel and had a beer and some lunch in the sun by the river. Turned out to be the last nice warm day I will probably get so good to make use of it. We were going to check out their occupation museum but it closed early on Sunday so we headed back to the hostel and a few of us continued to sit around in the sun drinking beer before heading out to the last night of the festival where possibly the worst band of all time was playing. Apparently they were big 10 years but now just seemed like aging Dracula wannabes playing strange metal type music…hilarious. Ended up back at the hostel after not too long and stayed up talking to some people.
It was time to move on, my last day before Tom and Rdoc would join me in Riga. Joe was heading up to Riga as well and we went via this place called the hill of crosses, apparently quite famous in the area. It is essentially a hill of crosses…thousands and thousands of crosses placed as memorials and devotion. They were bowled down by the Soviets but people continued to place them there and now the hill is really important for all Lithuanian people.
It was a 3 hour drive from Vilnius to the town then a following 2 hours to Riga, it was cool but a bit of a mission. 2 others joined us to come out but headed back to Vilnius after, it is a bit of a mission of a day trip. Also we had to make the bus to Riga so were really pressed for time, we had to take a taxi there so negotiated a flat rate with a driver, had a quick look around and rushed back to the bus with a minute to spare after arguing with the taxi driver who had decided a flat rate was no longer the case and was charging us the metered rate, an extra $10 or so….super frustrating but with our bus coming that instant we ended up paying. But we made the bus and were soon on our way towards Riga, the rain had set in and was cold….summer was no more and really cannot see it getting any warmer before Thailand. All those times of complaining about the heat and wishing it would rain have come back to haunt me now! Bring back the sun and warm weather…well not the 45 degree stuff but sun at least!
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