Lithuania

How to spend our last days in Finland? Right, with travelling. This time we made a trip to Lithuania.

From Turku we flew to Kaunas, which is the second city of Lithuania. 

After a flight from an hour and a little more, we landed in the city that seemed cold and dreary.. 

Not really what we expected. The pictures on the internet showed us a colorful city, in summer, so full with light. Now it looked black and white to us. But we tried to explore the city without prejudices and headed to our hotel. It was close to New Town and next to a bus station, so the perfect location. After we relaxed for a little time, we dragged ourselves out of the room and got ready for some exploring. We didn't do any research, so we just walked in a direction. We ended op in Old Town and bumped into a little Christmas market. Full of little stalls, with Lithuanian food, Christmas decorations and hot chocolate. There was also this big Christmas tree with all sorts of lights. 

After strolling around we got hungry, of course, and ended up in a sushi place where we ate the most delicious sushi ever, so good!



The next day we decided to do some cultural thing and went to the Ninth Fort. This place is a part of the Kaunas Fortress, which was constructed in the late 19th century. During the occupation of Kaunas and the rest of Lithuania by the Soviet Union, the fort was used as a prison and way-station for prisoners being transported to labour camps. After the occupation of Lithuania by Nazi Germany, the fort was used as a place of execution for Jews, captured Soviets, and others.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ninth_Fort


It was very impressive to see, but also different than other museums I visited. First there was a exposition with different information about different people and after that you could visit the fort itself and go inside. There was also this monument for the Holocaust.

Holocaust Monument

After this visit we walked around Kaunas for a bit and find nice places, but to be honest, Kaunas disappointed us a lot... We didn't feel really safe in the city, it was so dreary and really small. That's why we decided to spend our last day in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania. We got a bus ticket and after a two hour drive we arrived. This city is what we hoped to see in Lithuania! It looked really pretty, with nice buildings, bigger and good hotspots.

Also in Vilnius there was this Christmas market, and when we arrived they were just organizing a photo shoot for dogs, it was the cutest thing ever and we watched for a while. We strolled around at the Christmas market, and what we saw really surprised us... They were selling some Dutch goodies! We treated ourselves with 'Poffertjes' and a big 'stroopwafel'. We felt like we were at home for a minute.

Poffertjes

Stroopwafel

Vilnius showed us some nice places and we really enjoyed our day in the capital. The next day it was already time to fly back to Turku and we both realized that it would be one of our last days here in Finland.. It felt weird and good at the same time. I'm looking forward to go home again and see my friends and family, but it also feels weird leaving my second home..

But no time to think about this for long, 'cause today it's finally the day that we will go to Lapland!!! I'm so excited!

Stay tuned for my stories about everything I will do in Lapland and my last post about my time and Christmas in Turku.

Nähdään!

Aniek