Weekend in Lithuania
Lyric introduction
The first edition of this story burned in the fireplace without seeing the light, in the morning at work, when I realized that I had taken the wrong file from my desktop, I felt like Gogol with his second volume of a world masterpiece. Attempts to recover the memory were in vain, the TRIM function on my SSD knows its business well. So, the second stop is a trip around Lithuania. PS: If any of my other stories about mainland Europe were so covered, I would have thought: “Well, figs with him”, but not about Lithuania, let's go back together again to those wonderful days...
After returning from our Canary-Slovak travels, we literally took a break for one weekend, and then everything was according to the standard scheme - Friday-work-airplane-travel-airplane-work. We are flying on a small Boeing to another city in mainland Europe. Due to the fact that the plane was small, it took on all the vibrations of turbulence very well. The flight was not long, only 58 minutes.
After arrival, there was a long passport control, and far from being successful for everyone. Moreover, all the fails were near a specific window, although everything was perfect with our documents, we still chose another window for ourselves. Having passed the control, we left some kind of house of culture with stucco molding and all the necessary honors. I didn’t even notice at what point the airport turned into a home? The city was very cozy, we even danced a waltz to an imaginary Chopin at the stop, although at the time of writing the story it turned out that Dasha was dancing to Yevgeny Doga “My sweet and gentle beast. ”
The question of what language should be spoken here was tormented, but as soon as the minibus driver answered someone “Shchaas”, we realized that English would not be useful here. The Lithuanians spoke with a very interesting accent, and in the Canary Islands our personal waiter, originally from Lithuania, spoke the same way. Then we thought that he just had a speech impediment. Kindness and notes of simplicity are also clearly visible in the voice of Lithuanians.
Having reached our stop, we decided to use the progress of mankind to find a hotel - the GPS system. But here even he was powerless, at first we went straight, after 5 minutes we determined that the point was moving in the wrong direction, we went to the right. After another 5 minutes, realizing that the card was held upside down, they turned right again. Having found the right road, we turned right again and after 5 minutes we even passed the place where we started. It seemed that nothing would stop us on the way to bed.
Crossing the night crossing, we missed a group of guys carrying a big pizza. Crossing the road, the guys called us and offered to share pizza with them. Fine! The pizza was just too much. The guys spoke only Lithuanian. When I took pizza, the guy told me to take the second piece. Although Lithuanian is absolutely incomprehensible, the freebie does not require translation. I felt like Jekichan at the beginning of the film "Armor of God 2", when the locals told him to take their emeralds.
The guys decided to invite us to the club, but the communication problem was that only one of them knew English, and only one word "Dance". When I said “We sleep” apparently the sound of “V” in their language was “You”, the guys were trying to prove that they were the “Dance” and not “sleep”. Attempts to prove that we sleep were a failure, until one of the guys with very good diplomatic skills said "Okey, we sleep! " We decided on that, after thanking the guys for the pizza, we finally got to our room.
It's true that we didn't get into the room the first time, but that's already technical details. To be honest, we did not expect to get into our hotel on mainland Europe the first time after our experience with a hotel in Hungary. The hostess, having met us, warned that the girl Alice lives behind a large mirror. Then she said that she was joking, the girl's name is not really Alice. Since there were mannequin heads in the room, they were decorated with festive caps, so that apparently it was not so scary. Considering that we never saw the girl all the time, I doubted that we were talking about a material girl. Also, the price was so abnormally low for accommodation... But in fact, for a critical bug found on Airbnb. The night flew by quickly. So go ahead and explore!
The morning city was still asleep, the streets were deserted, but no less comfortable than at night. We went to get acquainted with the surroundings, and for one thing we climbed to the top of the fort, to look at the panoramas. On the way, we saw a local scam - a sobbing adult guy with very sore legs asks to buy him a certain ointment in a certain pharmacy for 22 euros. Everything would still be fine if it weren't for a bunch of these guys in the city. In general, don't get fooled. The opened view of the city only emphasized how we still have to work during these two days.
To begin with, we refreshed ourselves in the local confectionery "Coffee in" with a delicious cheesecake with berries, and then went to the center where girls with a yellow suitcase "Free walking tours" were waiting for us, though they were waiting not only for us, but about 50 more people. The most interesting thing is that everyone was from different parts of the globe. Australia and Malaysia were especially pleased.
The tour lasted 2.5 hours and was quite informative and rich. The tour also included a visit to the Republic of Uzupis, the existence of which I honestly did not know until the tour itself. And here we stand before the border
Už upis Republic
Fortunately, Uzupis is included in the Schengen zone and no additional visa was needed. This small state has everything, and its own history, and the parliament, and the consulate, in which you can put a visa and an entry mark in your passport. But the visa history of my foreign countries is dear to me as a memory, I did not risk it. It is convenient that the Parliament is in a pub, and laws are passed either with wine and cheese or with beer. On the walls of one of the streets hangs the constitution translated into 24 languages. In general, I want to express great respect to the Lithuanians for such a creative approach.
Vilnius again
Having already returned to our hometown, we went to check out the local cuisine. We wanted to visit the Dvaras themed restaurant, but the line bulged out into the street. Well, in our Lviv there are a lot of themed and unique restaurants, you can always find a free one, and when there is only one such restaurant in the city, it turns out to be a small problem. But a win-win business if you open another themed restaurant in Lithuania. We ended up having lunch at a nearby one.
Lunch was delicious, and even with Lithuanian beer. After the Canary Islands and Bratislava, it was quite unusual to eat delicious food abroad. Not far from the central square is a forest park with a mountain of three crosses. That's where we went, after warming up with mulled wine. By the way, the tour began to gain the features of a gastro-tour. While we wandered in the park, we met Santa with some Afro-Niger.
On the mountain itself it turned out to be so windy that the panorama could be seen with a maximum of one eye. Good thing we were a little warm. Having descended from the mountain, we went to visit a charity international fair of products and things.
At the entrance to the building, we noticed a man leaving with a large bag of prey. “Why does he need so many products, ” I thought. There were many stands on two floors, each one from a different country. Crowds were drowning around the stands, but for some reason there was no one at all near the Russian stand, not even promoters...
The business was about to close, and all the goods had to be sold, promotions began. The average unit price was 1 euro, or even three per euro. First we took Austrian pies and mead, and then we went to the Polish stand, there was a lot of goods, the situation had to be saved. Prices were in terms of hryvnias, as if the rate of eight had returned. Having collected durum pasta and having received something else as a gift, we went to get acquainted with other cuisines) Near one of the stands lay the future geocache traveler, just because I found out its price, I already received chocolate Santa Clauses for two euros as a gift . Excitement grew, and the time before closing became less and less. The stocks became more and more aggressive, and our bag is getting thicker.
We visited the Polish stand four times and already had the privileges of frequent visitors. The only thing I could not take from them was an infinitely large package of juices, since the plane would not have missed it. The girl, having opened a glass bottle of 100% orange juice, handed it to me under the pretext that I should try it, maybe I could figure out how to solve the problem with the plane. The time was already coming to an end and some shares had already gone for shares as a gift. And all this turmoil was in a positive and rather funny atmosphere. Some guy who hardly lifted a pack of juices got a package of pasta on top right on the go. The poor man could not hold the juices for long, he was lucky that they were tightly packed. When we had already firmly decided that it was necessary to pump up with the fair, having gone down to the first floor to the exit, we decided one last time to return to the second one to the Polish stand, for sweets. After such a catch, it was necessary to return to the hotel and unload.
On the way we laughed, discussing the funniest moments. All this pleasure cost us about 15 euros. Having rested in the room, we set off to explore the night city, the center of which was in the fair houses. On the main square there was a large festive tree with windows from which light comes. Looking through the window, we saw children sitting on stumps, to whom the frog told stories and all this for free.
We also wanted to listen, but not knowing Lithuanian significantly complicated the task. Everything around is so festive and with the aroma of cloves, hey, where do we have mulled wine in our hands again?
Tax, it's time to refresh yourself. This time we sat down in a real Lithuanian pub, and you know what? We ate delicious food again, we ate delicious food twice in a row in Europe! How could I not believe it after the previous trip. Fuh, the daily norm for the trip was completed, now you can sleep. Returning to the guesthouse, looking at the mirror with apprehension, we fell into bed. Slept hard.
In the morning we went to the bus station. Going to the window and saying, "We need two tickets... " we realized that we do not remember the name of the city. The girl in the window saved the situation with the question “Maybe in Trakai? ” Yes, that's exactly what we need. We drove for about 40 minutes and arrived at such a deserted place that there was not enough tumbleweed to complete the picture. But, as it should be, in all deserted places there is a taxi driver who is sure that we will definitely rebuild his dacha with our trip instead of walking as much as 2.5 km !! ! As a result, the taxi driver was left completely alone. On the way to the castle, we bought Cabanos sausages in the market, a bite to eat and go warmer. Soon we saw the castle.
The castle, of course, was fairly restored, or rather rebuilt. It was evident in places where there had been no bricks before; when rebuilt, it looks much better. I still remember how last year I went on an excursion to the Carpathian castle Tustan. They brought them to three large rocks and said, unfortunately, the castle had already burned to the ground, but earlier it was among these rocks... The scheme of the former castle looked majestic, it’s a pity we have not rebuilt it. And this one is really beautiful. We immediately took pictures and went to explore. We also got to some kind of children's concert, from children and for children.
Moreover, it seems like they have already got used to the language, and began to really understand what it is about. But no, they are not used to it, these children are just Poles. It was fun to wander around the castle, to see what, and how it was. Now you will listen to something near one excursion, then near another, then Dasha will read something from booklets. There was a real wind rose on the main square of the castle, but I wanted to eat so much that it didn’t hurt a bit.
There were a couple of inconspicuous doors in the walls near the square, I checked one, it turned out to be locked, but Dasha was more fortunate, behind her door was a real Lithuanian Santa Claus with the most real Lithuanian beard!
Santa Claus with a very cool diction congratulated us, took a picture with us, handed over postcards, stamped them with his own seal, and awarded us zukerki! Oh, how smartly and clearly he spoke words with a solid sign at the end. Santa Claus really liked that we are so happy to meet him that he asked his elf to take a picture of the three of us, and even with a staff, according to all traditions. And all this is free. Grandfather cheered us up so much that it was already worth flying to Lithuania just for him, not to mention the fact that we also really liked everything else in Lithuania.
On the way back, we flew to the bus station as if on a magical deer. On the way, we looked into the market and stocked ourselves with foreign promotional cheeses for almost three kilograms. They took literally every kind of cheese, which had an auction price tag, and there were many varieties) With another heavy bag, we arrived in a cozy capital. On the way to the hotel we went and bought more parmesan to complete the collection. He was just there for the action, but only for the owners of the super card. Fortunately, among the cashiers it was not difficult to find such an owner. This is not just a gastro tour, but the whole art of eating deliciously. Inspired by cheeses, we went to stand in line at that themed restaurant, and for good reason by the way) And Lithuanian beer complements the taste of each dish.
PS: while writing this snippet, I had to go into the kitchen and set up a little night dojer.
In addition to festivities in the center, we also planned to visit the business part of the city. It became sharply warmer outside and the sweater had to be handed over to the storage room of the market. So, in terms of the time of the walk, we were limited by the closing time of the market. It seemed like a lot of time, as much as 2.5 hours to hang out in the commercial area. But in the end, they flew like crazy, risking being left without a sweater, since in the morning they already had to be at work. In general, such an interesting feeling is always when you walk around the night abroad and even go to the hotel to sleep, while knowing that at work at 10 you will already be like a cucumber. Having picked up the sweater, we walked around the old center to the very end, until the wooden fair houses closed. I did not want to fly away from such a cozy country at all, and after all, over the weekend we managed to see only half, I would still like to visit Kaunas and the Curonian Spit in Klaipeda. But fortunately, we were already three years ago, but from Kaliningrad, when we opened the first travel season. It was very beautiful on the spit, and if we had not been there then, now we simply would not fly away from Lithuania. Of the four mainland European countries that we have already visited, I put Lithuania in first place.
Trip Information
Date of travel: 4.12. 2015 – 7.12. 2015
Duration: 2 full days (preferably at least 5 full days)
Flights: Mau
Hotel: Booked on Airbnb
Excursions: All by yourself, on foot
Visas: Self-obtained for Spain.
Trip difficulty: 2/10 (easy)
Expenses for two
Air: 144 euros Kyiv-Vilnius-Kyiv
Accommodation: €19 for three nights (€50 discount)
Restaurants: Average bill 16 euros for two
Bus: Vilnius-Trakai-Vilnius 8 euro
Total, including all described costs: 380 euros
