2 Days in Vilnius Lithuania

Am I crazy for booking a trip to Lithuania in the middle of January?… Maybe. Was it worth the £20 return flight with Ryanair?…absolutely! To be honest I think I got quite lucky with the weather on this trip because It was -3 degrees celsius but there was no snow.

Day 1

Literatų street is pretty and decorated with art dedicated to Lithuanian writers.

For lunch, I went to a restaurant and ate cepelinai. It’s the national dish of Lithuania and consists of potato dumplings filled with minced pork. This restaurant is called Pilies Katpėdėlė, and it’s located in the city centre, 5 minutes away from Literatų street.

The next stop was Vilnius cathedral. To be honest I didn’t go inside because I just didn’t have the energy to climb that tower with a freezing cold body.

I ended my day with a visit to the Museum of Occupation and Freedom Fights. I took this photo in the basement which represents what the prisons looked like. I would like to issue a disclaimer that this place can be quite traumatising. You will see some disturbing photos, but it’s important for people to learn about the horrible things that took place in the past.

Day 2

I started day 2 with a visit to a very bohemian café for breakfast. The egg was accompanied by a beetroot latte, which was surprisingly very tasty. Unfortunately, I can’t give you the name of this cafe because it has closed down 🙁

Then I headed off towards The Hill of Three Crosses, and ended up on a steep hike surrounded by woods. There are certain activities I generally wouldn’t do as a solo female traveller. Wandering around woods is one of them (haha!) But the “free spirit” in me told me to just keep going because there would be other tourists at the top.

This is the Hill of Three Crosses where 7 monks were beheaded.

Then I headed to the Republic of Užupis. Užupis is the Lithuanian version of the Vatican City in Rome. Some people consider it to be an independent state within Lithuania.

Užupis is a very bohemian area and there is a lot of art and sculptures outside. I like this random swing hanging from a bridge.

I got my passport stamped for free in the souvenir shop. Supposedly this stamp can cause problems because Užupis has not officially been recognised as independent from the rest of Lithuania.

For lunch, I ate Šaltibarščiai. This is a cold beetroot soup that people eat in the summer. You can find different variations of this soup in all the Baltic countries. After this, I wandered around for a while, and then took a bus to the airport.

It’s very easy to have a relaxing 2 days in Vilnius Lithuania. The attractions are all within walking distance, and the city is not crowded at all. Well…at least it wasn’t when I was there.