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Lithuania: 20th - 25th July 2009

In order to keep up with our travels, this blog will be short and sweet.

After the "72 Hours" we were happy to arrive in Vilnius, Lithuania's capital. We had a very comfortable apartment that was extremely close to the "old town". Once again, bikes are a fantastic way to see this city.

This is where we also started off with the Baltic cuisine, which was a pleasant surprise. Armed with maps and books of the city, off we went. Vilnius was in brilliant renovated status, to the point it seemed almost too brilliant, with buildings looking extremely fresh and new. I guess this is a good thing but a bit eerie after most of the cities we have visited.

Our day trip to Trakai proved another exciting day of cycling where there is a castle there that is reminiscent of the castle in Bled, which is not a bad thing. Actually, Trakai with its castle perched on a lonely island, made the cover of the Lonely Planet, so confidence was high. Doug and I walked across a short bridge onto the island, and this is when the mood turned tentative. We paid the admission fee, walked in, took one look around, and said "is this enough? do you really want to go inside?" This was the point at which we realized that we were officially “castled out.” We made a quick pass through the more accessible areas of the castle (which means, we skipped the tower, the dungeon, and the gift shop), and we were back on the trail. But there's plenty to see around the castle with miles and miles of trails along the water overlooking the castle.

From Vilnius, we headed west to the Curonian Spit, a narrow strip of dunes just off the coast that cross the border into Russia. The Curonian Spit has only recently been given protected status by the Lithuanian government owing to the steadily shrinking dunes. Hopefully they're not too late. We stayed just on the Lithuanian side of the border with Russia in a resort town called Nida. There, we spent the days enjoying hours of cycling along well marked trails running on the seaside and through the forested dunes. We were truly in our element.

Last but not least we headed towards Latvia, with a quick side trip to the Hill of Crosses. My first vision was of Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia. Well it couldn't have been further from this. Missing the turnoff we turned around and headed down a really nice path lined with old trees. At this point it started to pour. I can't complain too much about the weather because it tends to be at its worse when we are driving, which is okay. We pulled up the the crosses (see photo) in the rain and Doug says, “want to go check it out?” of course I reply, “absolutely not, but some coffee would be nice”. A few minutes later, the rain let up and we were walking towards the site. There are a few legends and myths about how the site got started, but however it started, it hasn't stopped. After browsing around for awhile it began to rain again. Having been lured away from the car, I knew my umbrella would keep me dry, but when it started raining again, I soon realized that half an umbrella would have to do. Doug forgot his in the car. “Isn't this romantic?” Doug asked? “Keep moving.”

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