Vilnius

Erin eating her first Cepelinai.
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Our first day in Vilnius was spent catching up on some sleep. After arriving on the bus we changed what euros we had left, John went to the loo in the train station, which was a yucky shock to him. The toilets weren’t the regular western sit down types we have at home but the Asian style squats that were disgustingly filthy. Lucky it was just number ones!

We decided to walk to our hostel after some bus confusion. It was a nice walk through the old town and past the Gates of Dawn until we got lost and frustrated with each other. After about an hour we found our hostel, up a dodgy street where a few feral cats live. Later I read that the district our hostel is in, is actually a separate state ‘The resident artists, dreamers, squatters and drunks of Užupis, due east of Old town, declared their district an official, unofficial breakaway state in 1998. The state has its own tongue-in-check President, anthem, flags and a 41-point constitution, which you can read in English, French or Lithuanian on a wall on Paupio Gatvė(Our Street).’ This text is from the Lonely Planet, Europe on a shoestring, 2007. The district does have a quirky feel but also a dodgy one too. The two bridges that go to Užupis over the river (creek) Vilnia has padlocks attached with lovers names and date, we found out that it is meant to like lock their love. We’ll attach a website address for you to read more. It is a very sweet sentiment.

View down the main shopping street of the Vilnius Old town looking down to the cathedral square.
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After a 5 hour nap we got up, showered and went for a look around and a bite to eat. We found the banks, shopping and a litho restaurant where Erin tried her first cepelinai. Cepelinai is a boiled potato dumpling with minced meat in its centre. It is served with a creamy bacon sauce. It was really tasty, warming and very filling. It is a good cheap eat. The texture took a few mouthfuls to get used to. The potato seemed a bit clagy to Erin but with the sauce and mince it’s really yummy. That night was an early one, we just headed home after some homemade Lithuanian style apple pie and fell asleep rather quickly.

The bridge to Uzupis district. note the lovers locks.
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The next day, our second day we went for a look around Vilnius and had a look in a Jewish Holocaust Museum. We visited 2 churches, St Anne’s and the Bernadine Church. Both were built around the same time, late 1500’s and are found right next to each other. After those churches we found our way to Cathedral Square, the Cathedral there has inside the chapel of St Casmir the patron saint of Lithuania. The Holocaust Museum was interesting, Jews had been living in Lithuania for 400 years prior to WW2, and before the Germans invaded Lithuania there were 240, 000 Jews living here and about 90% were killed. It was sad to see but it gave a good sense of history. That night we went out for dinner at about 8:30 and to our dismay every restaurant we walked into had closed their kitchens. We were used to Spain eating times, where you don’t eat dinner til past 9pm. Luckily we found somewhere open. We had great steak and 1.5 litres of beer each. It’s cheaper to order your beer in 500ml glasses. It was past twelve when we got home.

Paupio Street.
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Our third day was spent being a lazy one. We did some Internet stuff like working out our hotel for Erin’s birthday, did some Vilnius research, spoke to John’s Mum via MSN video call and a few other things. Oh we also had a bit of a sleep in. That night we didn’t venture far from our hostel and went to a pizza place in Užupis. The service was pretty slow but the pizzas were good, though John did get the wrong pizza. That night was early to bed.

The day before Erin’s birthday we moved to a different part of Vilnius to a 4 star hotel. The hotel was nice enough but we have stayed in nicer hotels for cheaper, oh well. We had a lovely big balcony and view of the not so pretty river Neris. The room also came with a deep bath, Erin’s birthday request. That night we went out for dinner with another Aussie girl named Evrim. We ate at a restaurant that was cellar style and served traditional Lithuanian cuisine. Ev had the cold beetroot soup, Erin tried some, and it wasn’t bad but wouldn’t eat a lot of it. We all had cepelenai. Beer and champagne was had also. After dinner we decided to get some alcohol and go back to the hotel before we head out. We bought a bottle of vodka, some warm juice and 2 big beer cans. After finishing all the alcohol and chatting away we decided to head out, though at this stage it had reached 2:30am. We went out anyway, but after 30 minutes of walking around and not finding anywhere that wasn’t charging an arm and a leg, we decided to go home to get some sleep instead.

This is the chapel of St. Casimir the patron saint of Lithuania inside the Cathedral. Note his Silver Cofin...short bloke.
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The Sunday we woke up with a knock on the door, Ev had come to join us for the buffet breakfast at our hotel. John stayed in bed, so it was just Ev and Erin. It wasn’t a buffet that we were used to. It had salads, cold fish and weird stuff. That day we all went to a big shopping centre, we ate lots of food, did some shopping and Erin got a birthday haircut. Ev and John also picked out a hair colour for Erin. It’s red, will put it in once we arrive in Berlin.

That was our last day in Vilnius. The next day we knew we had to leave but we hadn’t fully worked out our plans. We still hadn’t heard from Lena in Sweden so we were very worried about what to do. We had to sort our stuff out, so we booked a flight to Berlin from Riga in Latvia. It was by far the cheapest. Evrim was going to Riga to so we knew we could travel together. We wanted to visit the hill of crosses on the way so that night before bed Erin worked out how we could do it. The next day we all made our way to Šiuliai.