Klaipėda Lithuania

The final day of our road trip along the Latvian coast was to a city in Lithuania. Klaipėda is another coastal port city not too far over the southern border of Latvia. It looked like there were a lot of things to do around here, but this was another quick day and one night's stay before heading home. A whirlwind tour lets us cover lots of ground but misses some details. We choose to savour what we experience and follow instinct a bit instead of hitting every attraction on a top 10 list.

We found a brochure map marking the sculptures of Klaipėda including a sculpture park. We took a long walk to explore and see what the map revealed as a way to explore this city. The park was interesting and the old town was kind of cool. Riga's old town and abundance of Art Nouveau architecture is hard to beat in my opinion, but it's always interesting seeing other old towns in the area for comparison.

Vilnius - Užupis

I love interesting art and unusual places. Užupis in Vilnius, Lithuania was right up our alley with some fun outside areas to explore. It's an artist district with a twist. On April 1, 1998, the district declared itself an independent republic (The Republic of Užupis).

Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania

We had a great day exploring this big museum in Vilnius for the Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania. A new palace compound was reconstructed on the ruins of the old palace. Part of it opened in 2013 and the whole thing opened just last year in 2018. There's some history on it at the link above.

The ruins are incorporated in the interior of the building so just walking through that is really cool. Their great presentation of Lithuanian history and reconstructed palace rooms are also worthwhile. The whole thing was just 8 euro so it's worth at least a quick stroll through the buildings even if you're not that interested in their history. We were interested, so we spent most of the day here exploring it.

Vilnius

We took a Lux Express bus to Vilnius, Lithuania for the 3-day weekend. Lithuania is the country south of us. Latvia sits in the middle of the three wonderful Baltic countries. Lux is a great and affordable bus service with many trips per day to a variety of places in this region. The bus to Vilnius had some nicer premium seats similar to first class airline seats for only 10 euros more than the already affordable bus prices. The bus had a toilet, which was convenient for the 4 hour trip to not need pit stops.