15th of August 2019

When I looked into the baltics in preparation of this travel, I heard especially Vilnius being mentioned as the Baltics hidden gem (not to say, the hidden gem in the hidden gem). The tourism agency of Vilnius even went so far to say that Vilnius is ¨The G-Spot of Europe – Nobody knows where it is but if you find it is awesome!¨  

I was not sure what to expect but as you can imagine my expectations were immense. 

And that, even though I was not planning to go there in the first place. 

Originally I had planned to travel via the most efficient route through Kaliningrad to Nida (Lithuanias Mallorca as I should later find out). But since the Russian Visaprocess is an enemy that I yet failed to defeat, I decided to take the long route over Lithuanians capital. 

And I am happy I did, as it turned out to become my favourite stop of my travel upon this point. 

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After driving with the night bus from Gdansk to Vilnius, me and Felix – my new travel buddy (link post)  arrived at 6am in the morning at ¨Vilniaus autobusai¨ – the central bus station. 

As already mentioned, I had high expectations for Lithuanias capital and as we made our way from the Bus Station (at 6 in the morning) towards the city center it felt like we had made a huge mistake coming here. 

We were surrounded by grey buildings, tank stations and saw an occasional dog, cat or senior citizen walking over the damaged road. As we went on, it got busier, although this was just represented by an increasing amount of cars driving over the – now bigger – damaged roads, transporting Lithuanians to their working routine.

Felix and I looked at each other in wonder: should this be the hidden gem we heard of – the G-Spot of Europe?

As we went on however, the buildings got more sophisticated and the streets more clean and colourful – turned into a golden glow by the morning sun. This trend should continue and once we arrived in our hostel, we found ourselves in the beautiful old town of Vilnius.

Exploring the romance of Vilnius

Soon after we would make our way towards the walking tour and like in Gdansk, a shy looking guy  – that actually turned out quite charming – would lead us through the city, of which we already felt the charming atmosphere. 

When walking through the lovely streets, he told us about the time when Lithuania (then as part of Polish-Lithuania) was the biggest country in Europe reaching all the way to Ukraine and that Lithuanian is the oldest of all European languages. 

Furthermore, Lithuania, even though it was eventually baptised – as last country in Europe – (with the majority of people being Christian) has been impacted by Paganism a lot throughout its history. So is also one of the richest men in the country a Pagan, who set himself the goal to make this religious belief more popular again. Apart from that Basketball is apparently the second religion in Lithuania. 

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And at a certain point we even went to the state of Uzepis, a self-governing state in the middle of Vilnius, which started as a joke of Art students, but has its own post-office, ministers and currency by now (based on the value of beer). Located on an island in the center of the city, it really felt like you were entering a different world, with all kinds of street art projects giving the place a beautiful, playful atmosphere. 

By the end of the tour, I was in love. Vilnius´ small interwoven streets make it incredibly easy to get lost in a labyrinth of cafés, traditional pubs and artsy cornershops, selling clothes, sweets and basically anything you can think of. 

But Vilnius manages to preserve this bit of a hipster and young atmosphere without feeling posh or chasing trends – like it can feel in Berlin or Paris for example. 

In fact it feels like it has always been that way and the lack of tourists – comparable to other European capitals – definitely adds to this authentic feeling of coolness and relaxation of a blueprint of a city to stroll around on a Sunday afternoon. 

No rush, no screaming, no shortage of space – just cake and tea while the sun is flooding the little pathways with light. 

After the tour I got myself cepelinais, which was exactly what I needed: a fat heavy dumpling (in the form of a zeppelin, which is inspiring the name) and also the national dish of Lithuania (and at the main square you only paid 6€ for two of them, which I myself nearly could not finish). 

In the atmosphere of Vilnius I walked back towards the hostel and relaxed for a bit, before

I later still met with Felix and other people we met in Vilnius during the day. We enjoyed Lithanian beer and snacks (dried bread with garlic sauce) in the warm evening atmosphere of the city.