19th of August

The next day I mostly used to recover from the day before. At around 12:00 I got up and decided – against my most basic survival instincts – to rent out a bike once again.

As I knew that the border of the Russian enclave Kaliningrad would only be about three kilometres away, I wanted to use this chance and at least see how far I would get. And after driving through the Dunes of Nida for about 25 minutes, I saw the following:

I reached the official entrance to the danger zone. For anybody who reached this point, warnings (like the one above) were put on every tree and every piece of ground, which told you clearly that moving further would locate you in the “Russian Border Protection Zone” – which was obviously not legal.

Of course, brave as I am, I ran twenty metres in the zone and back – and till this day I am glad that I survived.

After checking this activity of my bucketlist, I decided to cycle back to my hostel. The rest of the day I spend mostly by eating icecream and some traditional Lithuanian potato pancakes.

Nidas Magic

In the evening I decided to take an evening walk towards the now familiar Parnidis dune. And that payed off!

Already when I was walking out of the little village alongside the grassy shore, I could see the spectacular pink glowing sky. On the other side, deer were jumping into the woods after the noise of my footsteps got their attention.

It was a beautifully clear evening and when I arrived on the top of the dune, the sunset had already begun to set in.

At this point I was looking over both sides of the island – one facing towards the baltic sea and the other towards the Lithuanian mainland. In between was the wide sandy valley on the foot of the Parnidis dune infront of me and the peaceful green of landscape of pinetrees behind my back.

The sky turned from bright pink into a light orange glow and just at this moment, an old Lithuanian man, who was standing with me on top of the dune, took out his violin and played so soft and clear that you could feel years of practice coming together in one moment.

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And it really was a perfect moment.

Even after the sun was already swallowed by the baltic sea for the better part of 30 minutes, the old man was still playing, seemingly wanting this moment last forever. I never even saw his face, but yet he made this moment unforgetable for me.

Eventually the sky turned from violet, to an increasingly darker blue and also the sound of the violin would fall silent.

But this did not mean that the spectacle was already over, because now you could see glittering points of light appearing in the darkness above. One by one they became visible and after around 40 minutes after the sun fell into the sea, the sky was decorated with what seemed thousands of little daimonds.

I was not the only one who came to see this piece of natural beauty and after a while I got into a conversation with a Lithuanian couple, who had also spend their summer holidays in Nida and would go to Berlin and London soon after.

But after a while also they went home and I was alone in a the pure bliss of natural beauty.

After around another 40 minutes of starring in the illuminated sky as well as to the lights of boats cruising around the Corunian Spit, I decided to head home as well and take this magical experience to an end.

But it seemed like today should be my lucky day.

Once I was heading down the primitive stairs, which where built on the descent of the dune, I heard voices. First I was not sure if that was a product of my imagination (after all the night was pretty magical already), but after a few minutes I saw just another couple coming my way.

When I greeted them however, they seemed a bit stressed and I should also find out why: Appearantly there was a moose down in the forrest (which was actually my way home), which they tried to escape from.

Just at that moment two other guys appeared in the path behind me and we told them about the situation. Now feeling strong in a group of five nightwanderers, we decided to head down into the forrest.

The second we left the descend and entered the entrance to the forrest, the couple began to walk faster and faster until they were running over the little path, still turning around and wishing me goodluck, before dissappearing in the dark of the night. I honestly don’t remember what happened to the other two guys, but I guess the two of them followed their example, because – again – I was alone in the bliss of nature. The only difference was that I was not really alone this time.

I could also not really understand why the others where in a hurry that much – would it not be awesome to see a moose? Well, the longer time I spend in the dark of that forrest, the less excited I got about that idea myself – especially after I heard some noises in the bush and imagined how me (and the moose) would actually react when we would meet each other. Latest when the silhouette of a signpost towering infront of me, gave me the shock of my life, I decided it would probably be a good idea to head home as soon as possible.

(Un)fortunately I did not see any moose that evening anymore and would fall asleep one last time in my new found paradise – Nida.