26 April 2007. Started out the day walking around Vilnius on some of the other main boulevards we missed on Wednesday. The morning light on Cathedral Square was auspicious and lasted throughout the day. I was intrigued by St. Helena atop the cathedral and can’t recall many other cathedrals topped with a female figure other than perhaps Mary herself. Now to figure out what St. Helena’s claim to fame was…. We had a coffee on Gedimino prospecktas across from the National Drama Theatre with its dramatic sculpture of the three muses overlooking the theatre entrance. We also s [View Full Entry]

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25 April 2007. Arrived in Vilnius almost 24 hours on the dot from getting up to leave from Seattle, mostly on account of a 5 hour layover in Frankfurt and delay on our flight due to “a suspicious liquid in the cargo hold left over from the previous flight, which arrived from Lisbon, that the fire brigade had to inspect wearing HazMat suits, which turned out to be antifreeze.” That account thanks to the LH captain; surabundance of information…. It begs the question though: who needs antifreeze in Lisbon or when its 80˚F+ in FRA? We’re staying at a 3rd [View Full Entry]

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We have spent the last week in Lithuania and loved every minute of it! Our first stop after leaving Riga was Siuali to see the Hill of Crosses. A cross in Lithuania apart from the obvious symbolises defiance against foreign invasion- something that Lithuania has experienced a lot of from Germanic knights in medieval times to the Soviets more recently. Apparently crosses had been put on this particular hill from around 12th Century and in 1930 there were around 400 crosses. As the hill was such a symbol of Lithuanian nationalism the Soviets removed the crosses (only to be replaced by [View Full Entry]

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Yesterday was a rough (and crazy amazing) day on the road and the whole journay lasted for 12 hours. Serious problems getting out of Lithuania's capital.Caught the tram to get out of the city. Hard to find good hitching position...Long wait, no ride. April had her leg hurting really bad. But she's a tuff girl...after some painfull 30 minute walk to the highway's gas station we could get a ride to Alytos in a sportive car ( here a lot of people TUNE their cars.but they don't look crazy as in Portugal... ) . We needed to get to Ladzije, near [View Full Entry]

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Lost! Pods! Yoghurt! Saws! We spent our first night in Vilnius tramping around in the rain looking for a new hostel after the first one we checked into had a totally smashed off lock. The girl at reception tried to tell us it was ok and 'everybody gets scared but nothing happens' - like hell! We got out of there smartish and eventually (after two and a half hours of trekking) found a really nice place with Japanese style pods instead of beds. The most comfortable beds ever! Until the sawing started. They were trying to get ready for some sort [View Full Entry]

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Hello, Irene, Torin and I have been here for a couple months now and just getting around to telling people that we're not in Kansas anymore. Actually Seattle was the home town, but that's underwater now and Vilnius recently had it's hottest date (December 4) in it's previous 500 years (I'm not making that up). We were expecting artic weather and got more Seattle weather - must be that global warming finally paying off for someone...The school where we are teaching is going well and we're starting to settle in. The good points - High speed DSL, a warm three story [View Full Entry]

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I totally stole that title from a t-shirt. Always cite your sources. So my father and I rolled out of Saint Petersburg and out of Russia on a train bound for Vilnius, via Latvia. Contrary to what I expected, I was not detained by the Russian border officers. We were, however, woken at several points in the night by men wearing large fur army hats of various colors who demanded our passports, which we wearily produced. From Vilnius station we made our way to the flat of Kerry Keys, poet, located in the old Jewish Ghetto of Vilnius. The city can [View Full Entry]

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This city was steeped in steeples, literally! From the moment we walked through the gates of Historic Vilnius I was overwhelmed by the sight of churches…Medieval, and Gothic, and Renaissance, OH MY! 15 out of the 20 churches in the old town were actually closed down or turned into warehouses during the Soviet period, resulting in the disappearance of much of the valuable pieces of art, but the facades remain beautiful. Despite this, the old town in Vilnius is one of the largest in Eastern Europe. In 1994, it was declared an internationally significant site and was included on the World [View Full Entry]

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“How much to the Old Town?” I asked the taxi driver, a middle-aged Lithuanian man parked just outside the small terminal at Vilnius International Airport. “Forty Litas,” he answered in deep Eastern European tones. His eyes, I noted, didn’t flinch a fraction of an inch. It was just as we expected. Forty Litas was about eight British pounds. Over the odds for the short fifteen minute journey into town. I decided to try haggling. By my side, Jodie rolled her eyes. She knew it was sure to end in disaster. “Twenty Litas,” I said with an air of [View Full Entry]

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I hope not too many people were caught up in last week's near-incident in the UK - it was good to hear the authorities were one step ahead. --------- I'm into the swing of things here and enjoying the "simple life"! The daily challenges are limited to finding non-stodgy food to eat; communicating with the locals; and locating a comfy bed - entirely different from my life pre-1 August! Meg and I have spent the past week or so travelling along the Baltic coast by bus (we've clocked 26hrs so far!). From St Petersburg to Tallinn was an 8hr trip in [View Full Entry]

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