Exploring the Baltic States -

The Baltic States – Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania Week 12 Europe Roadtrip

What a joy it was on Week 12 Europe Roadtrip to be back in cheaper countries! It makes the budget breathe a sigh of relief! Everything from food, fuel and alcohol (very important!) is cheaper here.

Miss B is happy to have got all her hat pins for each country. She is getting quite the collection now. Miss B is very excited to have hit 28 countries and she is only 10 years old!

The roads definitely got worse as the week wore on. There was even a bit of guess work (thank goodness for tom tom or GPS) in Lithuania and Poland with badly signed roads and the driving style a little more radical (trying to be nice here but sheesh!!!)

See our youtube weekly wrap video here

Visiting Tartu July 31

Arriving in Tartu, what a gorgeous little town! Walking around the cobbled streets,

walking across both the angels bridge and the devils bridge. A beautiful town to just stroll around with beautiful murals on walls, statues and lovely areas to picnic.

The famous water fountain of the kissing students in the main square is pictured left.

We have had some very hot weather. The sun has quite the bite even when the temps are very normal to back home in the thirties.

Heading off to Parnu where our wildcamp (2 Euro a night) with showers for 1.30 Euro on the water.

Taking a late night stroll around the harbour led to some fun on swinging bridges for all of us, even if we were wearing thongs!

Saaremaa August 1

Pinch and a Punch first of the month! Onto another ferry and out to the island of

Sareemaa – Maasilinna Medieval fort-castle

Saaremaa. Visiting the Maasi stronghold ruins of Maasilinna medieval fort-castle established in 1345 by Livonian Order. The first castle was built of wood but soon after reconstructed of stone. It was destroyed twice in the Livonian War. The 8m walls that survived the destruction left for us to wander through.

Kuressaare Castle whether you go in or just walk the grounds, is a lovely place to visit. It is the only medieval fortification in the Baltic States that has not undergone extensive alterations. The local handicrafts including, stone mason, glass

blowers and a blacksmith are tenants of the small shops built into the hill surrounding the castle.

There had just been a festival or concert of some kind and there was a large stage and scaffholding equipment everywhere. Not good for photographs.

A drive out to our wild camp (with free power I might add) saw us go past Tiirimetsa Church, a limestone building built in 1873 which was badly damaged in World War II.

Beautiful wildcamp on the water (with free power!) allowed me to catch up on some work, have everything charged and ready to go again.

Carnikava August 2

Day largely spent driving, dropped in for another shower at Parnu and then off to Latvia!

Not happy with our first choice of wildcamp, after dinner we made our way to Carnikava which was right on the beach. Us and a LOT of locals enjoyed the sunset, we walked in the Baltic sea and it was great to just relax a bit after being on the road all day.

August 3

Set off early for Riga and spent hours walking around and enjoying this city. A wonderful ‘Tolerance’ art exhibition was in one of the squares with bears painted by famous artists of each country.

Amber is traditionally from Latvia and as our Miss Bs middle name is Amber (as is, her god mothers) we purchased her some lovely earrings as part of her birthday coming up later this month as a memory of our trip to Latvia.

Visiting the local markets is always on our to do list in capital cities. This time we secured some (after taste testing!) local honey that was amazing. I swear Miss B can seek out a free taste testing a mile away!

We really enjoyed visiting Riga.

Staying in a camp ground tonight, ahhh warm showers, refill water, dump the toilet and wait for it…….FREE WIFI….that really works!! So the software got updated on laptops, phones and Tom Tom. Miss B was in heaven getting on with some of her Minecraft friends.

August 4

Off to explore Kuldiga and see Europe’s widest waterfall at 240m it was first mentioned in 1242. Another beautiful town, cobblestone streets, so clean and well kept. Perfect picnic spot.

Home also to the red brick bridge crossing the river Venta built in 1874. The 164m bridge, one of the longest red clay brick bridges in the world, was damaged in World War 1. Two spans of the bridge were damaged by the Russian army in 1915. This was restored in 1926 and we are very glad they did, it is a beautiful

bridge. A BEAUTIFUL town and not to be missed. When you think you are driving out of it there is a lovely square and more wonderful buildings.

Driving through the old part of Liepajas, what a difference in architecture. The soviet style of building, concrete blocks of buildings, one after the other. The old prison has been fenced off, as has many old dilapidated buildings street after street. There is some video in our weekly youtube wrap for those wanting a better idea.

Curonian Spit

Wanting to explore the Curonian spit. We shouldn’t have. Boarding the ferry at a cost of

24.10 Euro! This is for a journey no more than 150m in distance but hand gestures from the attendant led us to believe we were going to get back for this amount to (which was correct) and we got to test this a lot sooner than we thought!

You get over there, file off and we headed for Neringa National Park only to be told that it would be another 30 Euro for the campervan to go through a set of gatehouses on the road. We were a little over the island by now, the two parking places before this were full and had parking meters per hour on them anyway. Basically, we cut our losses, turned around and joined the queue to get off the island. This was the perfect time to enjoy my miniature bottle of champagne Brett bought me from Riga.

Driving well into the night, me as spotter (there are Deers all through these Baltic States) we only saw a couple but you can not be too sure. We rarely drive after dark and as we have not had dark for so long (Scandinavia had midnight sun during our time there) we were not wanting to take any chances.

Finally getting to our wild camp at the entrance there was a military vehicle, we talked with them and they asked us where we were going, checked our Tom Tom (GPS) and said we were welcome to stay in the wild camp and promptly moved their vehicle.

August 5

Waking at our wildcamp which we could not really see on arrival last night, it was a really great spot.

Over the other side of the river was Russia, this was as close as we were getting and probably explained the presence of the military police last night.

Making our way towards Vilnuis, the capital of Lithuania there were dark clouds following us. Finding a Maxima supermarket we decided we would grab some bits n pieces. Soooooo excited to let everyone know they sell cooked roast pork pieces, like large pieces which we bought, cut up added to fresh baguette along with apple sauce and Yum Yum YUM! Better still it was really cheap!

Centre of Europe?!

Tried to call in to the ‘centre of Europe’ one of approximately 7 claims in various parts of Europe. On arriving we were told there was a per person charge and a parking charge. We are not really into these type of tourist traps so bid them a lovely day and left.

The roads in Lithuania are terrible, in terrible repair and the drivers on them.

There is a wild camp right near Vilnius. We met some lovely German travellers, in various size rigs and had a good chin wag (talk, for non Australians).

August 6

Got up early and took off to explore Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania. Visited the miracle tile a tile in between the Cathedral Square and the Belfry with the word Stebuklas (miracle) on it. It has an amazing story!

This tile marks the Southern terminus of an estimated 2 MILLION person chain linking the Baltic States through their capitals (Vilnius, Riga & Tallinn). The human chain was formed in 1989 as a political protest against Soviet occupation and stretched 650km to Tallinn. Amazing!!

Today, the tile is a symbol of hope and inspiration.

You are supposed to make a wish then spin 360 degrees on the tile, which Miss B and I did. What an incredible story!

Unfortunately for us, we had hoped to visit the Museum of Genocide but it is closed on Mondays and Tuesdays. There was an amazing art exhibition done by children of various ages on display outside the building. This really resonated with Miss B and provided a talking point for us to try and convey the horrific history and what it would of felt like to be part of it.

WC or toilets will be charged for normally about 30c per person in town.

Walk through town, short and sweet compared to some of the amazing towns we have visited.

Trakai

As we left Vilnius, we went to Trakai, the historical capital of Lithuania. We had tried to dothis on Sunday but it was INSANE busy, no parking. Avoid weekends!

We parked Betsy, paid parking and wandered into town to see the island castle in Lake Galve. There were markets on the river and a really nice walk around the castle grounds. You can pay to go in, but we were happy to stroll around the grounds. The castle commenced building in the second half of the 14th century. It is a restored red brick gothic castle with a footbridge that links to shore.

Long drives ahead, as we headed for Poland. Crossing the border, more road signs to learn. If it is possible they drive even more insane than the Lithuanians. I have no idea how there are not more head on accidents.

Lots of strange looks at our car, don’t believe many tourists come through some of the areas we ventured.

Stopped to look at some local markets. The prices they were asking for some antiques, some not quite antiques, were so inflated it was a waste of time. Red light goes on when every question of price starts with ‘Very rare, Very old…..’LOL

Until next week….

What did we take

If you are interested in what we took, electronics, kitchen and all things we needed for the duration of our roadtrip click here. (we are slowly adding each week as we have data/time)

Having done a three and half month roadtrip last year in South Europe we were pretty confident in what we would need’this time. Also, what worked and what we would not bother taking again.

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