Austeja Palanga

So, jetzt finde ich endlich mal wieder die Muße mich hier literarisch zu ergießen.<br>Ich habe meinen Rucksack gepackt, hab die Tür hinter mir abgeschlossen und bin zum Busbahnhof. Habe es irgendwie der dicken Dame hinter dem Schalter begreiflich gemacht, dass ich nach Klaipeda möchte. Ja ich bin Student, ja in Vilnius... WO IST DAS PROBLEM? Im allgemeinen lösen sich Sprachbarrieren aufgrund unterschiedlicher Verständigungsbasis nicht durch Erhöhen der Lautstärke, aber auch das ...

It took just over 3 hours to drive from Vilnius to Klaipeda with very light traffic. The drive is a little boring, but comfortable. The Magnisima Hotel is in the new (er) part of town within walking distance from the old town and with a secure parking lot in the rear. The room (#7) is very spacious and tastefully furnished. The street misses a couple of light poles, so gets a ...

... celebrations are being held. It is hard to find. I and many others go down some dead ends before finding the path. It is packed with thousands of people. A naval ship is decked out. Huge monitors show the performers who sing, dance and talk. The culmination is the national anthem, supposedly synced with spots all over the world. Very cool to participate in something so monumental for the Lithuanian people.

... the ferry. I grab a Kabab and a beer in the 5 minutes I have before the ferry. 60 people join me. The fare is $1.20 round trip. It is a short, 15 minute ride to the Curonian Spit. From the port at Smiltyne, it a 10 minute walk to the beach through some beautiful forested areas. As the forest disappears, the dunes appear. Then, the Baltic Seal. <br><br>As I approach the ocean, the path splits. To the right, all the young, beautiful women. To the left, the couples with kids ...

... know it was there. They built four silos, each housing nuclear missiles, each of which was 10x the power of Hiroshima or Nagasaki, and being in Western Lithuania, had enough range to reach anywhere in Europe or Turkey. It was mobilised, ready to launch on a few occasions during the cold war. In fact during that time the Russians had so many enemies (perceived or ...

... people ordering them for breakfast too! I met the two guys the next morning for a long walk to this house a friend of theirs recommended that was only about $10 a night (instead of the $30 I was paying). Along the way the guys inquired about rates at different places. All of the owners only spoke Lithuanian so I had no way to even ask about vacancies so the guys were a big help. Many were already booked and those that weren't were very expensive. Eventually we reached our ...

Ignore what we said about the worst campsite this beats the lot - toilets were holes in the ground, the shower was invented by the local made professor and was patented trust me when i say no one will by buying it!. As for Palanga it deserves better a great beach resort with loads to do and see, cheap and good fun for a few days or a week well worth a visit. While we were their they were holding a ...

... looking and was hobbling around due to a broken leg. We tried to get into the Amber museum but it was closing for the day. The building itself was quite nice and reminded me a little of the Villa Borghese in Rome (see Euro 2006 blog entitled "What's Mr. Bean doing in a choir?!!??!?") We took a stroll back to the guesthouse where the owner asked us to change rooms. She seemed to suggest there was a problem ...

... the beach on the other side. We had to alter the course slightly when Ben (who could thankfully read Russian) saw a sign and realized we were 700m from Kalingrad, Russia. Whoops, don't know how close you can get to the Russian border, in a forest, without getting hassle and didn't want to find out! Spent some time walking around the dunes, which were very impressive, and then checked out the beach on the other side of the Spit before heading ...

... to have a look. We were lucky, as a bus pulled up almost straight away, and we were off - another 30 min trip down to Nida, the southern most town on the Lithuanian owned part of the Spit. Nida was much busier than Juodkrante, and it was windy and overcast. We went for a walk along the lagoon side, with many statues and beautiful parkland alongside the lagoon like a promenade. It was a nice walk - so relaxing. We felt a world away from our previous days, if not weeks of travel ...