Vilnius, Lithuania: Exploring the Baltic region

First trip to the Baltic states

We had been excited with my boyfriend before travelling because it was our first trip to the Baltic region. We knew that the weather would be cooler and more changeable than the summer in Hungary, so we packed warmer clothes, too. Honestly, I didn’t even need that summer T-shirt and pants that I packed just in case…

Our flight was in the morning, so we were in Vilnius before noon. The first shock for me was the airport itself. It didn’t seem like an airport, but rather an old train station. Though it was a beautiful building, I felt a bit strange that we were at an airport… A few days later, when we flew back to Budapest, we were surprised to see that the departure area was a totally modern building, right next to that train station-like arrival area.

First, we had to find our hotel (aparthotel) to leave our luggage there. It was still not possible to check in, but we were fine to start exploring the city with a handbag. The air was cooler and clear, we could immediately feel that. It was almost lunchtime, so we were walking around a bit, but then headed towards downtown to find the restaurant I had previously seen on the internet.

Eating out and diversity of old and new

Well, the food and eating out was quite a challenge for me in Lithuania. As I cannot eat gluten, and dairy products are also not so good for me, I always search for options online before I travel somewhere. This time, I could only find a few restaurants in Vilnius that would be suitable.  But I hadn’t imagined that we would struggle so much with finding food that is good for both of us. Once, we tried a traditional dish, potato dumplings, which were delicious but unfortunately upset our stomach after some time. Other than that, I either had some grilled chicken with fries or had a pizza or pasta in an Italian restaurant, the only one in the city offering gluten-free options. It always seemed to be a good option, so we ate there three times during our stay (a bit less than a week). Besides these, once we tried out a Vietnamese restaurant, in the hope that it would be good for our stomach; and it was. 😊

Lithuania, at least the capital city Vilnius, turned out to be much more expensive than we had thought and what we had heard before. We were surprised to see Western European prices in restaurants, cafés, souvenir shops, but even in grocery stores. It was strange, considering that we were in a city full of old buildings and houses, with lower livings standards than in countries with similar prices. However, the transportation is good and easy to use, although there are only buses running all over the city. You can buy a ticket either by downloading a great app or using the contactless paying option on the bus. I could also buy our train tickets to Kaunas easily on the internet. There are a lot of renovations and developments going on in Vilnius and around, for instance the restaurants and cafés are beautifully decorated from inside, even if they are in older buildings. Our apartment was also a very modern one, the building was renovated inside. However, it was shocking to see it sometimes, how people live there, in such old houses! We often complain in Hungary about the older block of flats, but those over there are really in bad conditions. Sometimes there were very modern office buildings very close to these old houses or blocks of flats. They exist side by side. It was fascinating to see such diversity within one city. Although there are modern buildings and developments going on, and they use Euro as their currency, it is not a very developed country, at least not yet.

Sightseeing and walking around in Vilnius

A few days are enough for Vilnius, at least if you don’t want to visit all the museums, because there are a lot of them. Before the journey, I had done some research on the internet, and we chose three museums we wanted to visit. Finally, we only went into the dukes’ palace and the Automuseum, but we also visited quite a lot of churches, which do not have entry fees. You can find many Catholic, but also Orthodox churches in Vilnius, and they are beautiful. We also went up the hill where there is a small castle or fortress. You can either walk or pay for the cable car; we chose to pay three euros for that. The view is beautiful from the hill, you can basically see the whole city, so it’s really popular among tourists. By the way, Vilnius is not a crowded city, they don’t suffer from over-tourism, at least not yet. But it seems to become more and more popular and is also becoming more expensive. I guess it’s considered to be an interesting and unusual destination, plus its climate is perfect in the summer for those like me, who prefer lower temperatures and not the heat. We had perfect weather for sightseeing, and we walked a lot each and every day. Lithuania is a very green country, with lots of nature, which is not surprising, as it basically rained every day while we were there; but it was often sunny, too.

The Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania was a nice place to visit, and you can spend a few hours there if you buy a ticket for the whole museum. We could read a lot about the history of Lithuania; there was a lot of new information for me. There were also some renovated rooms showing us how the palace looked like. And many other things… I would definitely recommend this place to visit in Vilnius.

We planned the Automuseum Vilnius for the last day when it was supposed to rain a lot. We were very lucky, as it was only raining while we were in the museum. Everything was still very wet when we walked out from the building, but it was already getting sunny again. The museum itself was astonishing with lots of cars and motors on two floors. It reminded me of the Ford Museum in Detroit, which I could visit last summer. Although this one isn’t as big as the one in the U.S., we both enjoyed it a lot and spent there about two hours, taking a lot of pictures. It was fun for me too, not just for my boyfriend. 😉

Besides that, we visited the artistic district of the city, which used to be an independent republic! They had their own constitution that you can still read on a wall in one of the streets, and thus in many different languages. It was very interesting and the whole district is worth a visit. Nothing spectacular but small streets with nice cafés and small shops, where you can walk around and enjoy the vibes of the artists’ district.

Most of the time, we were just wandering around the city, with a curiosity to see and experience how it is in one of the Baltic capital cities. Well, it was rather a middle-sized European city rather than a big capital, but it was enjoyable. Here, you don’t have to worry about public transport or the different metro lines (as there is no subway), and you won’t be disturbed all the time by the crowd of tourists. You can just walk and walk, eat something in a traditional restaurant or a café, and take some time to relax. 😊

Trip to Trakai, the former capital city

From Vilnius, you can get to Trakai by bus or train. We took the bus, and it was just about 40 minutes from one city to the other. It was raining when we left Vilnius, but it was beautiful sunny weather in Trakai. No surprise, as the weather was always very changeable during our stay. Sometimes a T-shirt was enough in the sun, but then it suddenly started to rain, and it cooled down a lot. We always needed to take our sunglasses, umbrellas and a jacket with us. But back to Trakai: it is a cute little town with colorful wooden houses that are typical in Northern Europe. While walking along the main street of the town, it was hard to imagine that this used to be the capital city… The most famous sight there is a castle which is located on a small island. You can walk there from the street; there are bridges on the lake. It is a very touristy place; we heard people from different countries. Due to that, there are quite a lot of souvenir shops and cafés or ice-cream places near the castle. We didn’t buy a ticket to go inside, but we enjoyed it from outside and the whole view of the lake and the castle. It was a beautiful and calm, relaxing place, I really liked it. I would say that this was my favorite part of our journey.

Two tips, if you’d like to visit this beautiful place:

– Buses and trains don’t run very often; you might need to wait an hour or even more. It’s good to check the schedule online.

– There is no public transport inside the town, so you need to walk from the train station or bus station to the castle. It takes about half an hour or a bit longer, but you can enjoy the relaxing atmosphere of Trakai.

One sunny day in Kaunas

Kaunas is the second biggest city in Lithuania and it’s about one hour away from Vilnius, so it’s perfect for a daytrip. We travelled there by train, enjoyed the warmer, sunny weather, and even saw some Lithuanian weddings!

We travelled by eco-train; it used green energy and was also decorated like that. The journey was comfortable, but it was only about an hour and a half long. We didn’t need our extra pullovers and jackets in Kaunas, as it was a summer day with lots of sunshine. After getting to the city center by bus, we walked a lot in the downtown area. It’s not a big city, so you can easily walk everywhere, have a look at the famous buildings, maybe visit some churches (you don’t have to pay for any) or just enjoy the restaurants and cafés or do some shopping. One day was perfectly enough for us, we had lunch in a traditional restaurant, we could sit outside in its garden. Later, we had some snacks such as ice-cream, but the prices were ridiculously high. My ice-cream was about twice as much as in Hungary, and the quality was worse. Anyway, it was nice to enjoy the vibes of the city, and it was even more special thanks to the weddings that were held on this sunny Saturday. We could see people in elegant clothes and dresses all around downtown, and once we suddenly found ourselves in a Lithuanian wedding! We walked into the cathedral where there were some tourists and then came the bride and everyone else into the church for the ceremony. The tourists were just smiling and took some photos, just like me. 😊

There is also a castle in Kaunas and a nice park next to it. You should definitely walk around there and take some photos, if you visit this city. We made an afternoon walk there before heading back to the train station. It was a nice day, and we walked as much as on the other days in Vilnius: about twenty thousand steps per day…

Flying home

On the last evening, we packed everything, as we had to leave for the airport the next morning. There was a bus which took us directly to the airport and it didn’t take much time. Unlike in many other cities where you need to pay a lot to get to the airport, in Vilnius you pay only one euro, and you are there within half an hour.

As I have mentioned before, the departure area is in a modern building, but it is not too big and does not have all the options that I would expect from an international airport. We wanted to have breakfast before our flight, and I needed my morning coffee. I was surprised that they did not have plant-based milk alternatives in the cafés, only at one place (but I had to ask at three other places before). After all, it was quite a rush, but we caught our flight and arrived in Budapest about two hours later.

Conclusions

All in all, it was a nice journey, but at some points we were either surprised or disappointed. The prices were too high for such a destination, the souvenir shops were not great, it was very hard to find appropriate food for my diet and dishes that wouldn’t upset our stomachs. Desserts, cakes, ice-cream are extremely sweet, they do not have sugar-free coke in many restaurants, they only have lemonade or other juices full of sugar. The traditional dishes are very fatty and hard to digest. Local people were sometimes nice, sometimes not so much. They mostly speak English, especially the younger staff in the downtown area. The country and the capital city are developing, but there is still a huge gap between the modern buildings, the renovated ones and the old houses. It was sometimes poverty that we could see there. Before this trip, I could not imagine people living in such old houses… It was all new for me what I saw, and it was an interesting experience. What I will definitely miss from Vilnius is the nice climate in the summer and the rather chilling way of enjoying the city.