It was cold and snowing. The apartment's owner's son was kind enough to drive us to the train station. They have a special train running from the station to the airport.
The train to the airport (see the falling snow?):
The train to the airport was a short one and so did the journey (not longer than 20 minutes). There were only 4 people on board including us and the officer checking for tickets. The airport was so quiet and empty it almost felt deserted. I guess nobody really flew in this kind of weather.
After dealing with all paperwork and informality, we could finally settle in our rented car. We decided to rent a car so we could go to places. Another reason was because of the freedom having a car would give us - we could stop and go whenever we wanted.
Our first destination was Trakai. The 30-km road to Trakai was dirty because of the snow and after a while, boring. Just look at the photo below and you'll see why it was boring. Only trees or empty spaces and snow along the road and the dirt caused by the snow. The weather - snowy and gloomy - did not help making it more cheerful either.
The road to Trakai:
Why Trakai, some of you might be wondering? Well... two reasons. One was for the famous island castle and the other one was because Trakai has AJ Sokolada (AJ Chocolate). AJ Sokolada is a chocolate manufacture engaged in hand-made production of chocolate according to, funnily enough, the best oldest Belgium traditions. Every morning fresh chocolate products are being transported from here to different shops in Vilnius, Kaunas and Klaipėda. The shop however did not just sell chocolate but also, to our delight, delicious cakes.
Trakų salos pilis (Trakai Island Castle):
Not surprisingly it was still snowing when we arrived in Trakai. The town was very quiet and again it felt almost like a deserted town. Everything was white from the snow.
We walked to the castle via a bridge. Trakai island castle is located on an island of Lake Galvė and reachable by a bridge connecting it to the mainland. You will not be able to see the lake surrounding the castle on my photo as the lake was frozen and covered with snow. We saw one or two people fishing on the lake though... yes, they first dug a hole and then set their fishing rod and just sit there in the cold and snow waiting for a fish to take the bait.
From the castle, instead of walking straight to our car which was parked as near as possible to the bridge, we decided to walk to the opposite direction to try to find the town center and the AJ Sokolada cafe.
We walked down Karaimų gatvė, passing Trakų pusiasalio pilis (the Trakai Peninsula Castle), and finally came to AJ Sokolada cafe where we sat for a while to have a rest (believe it or not, walking in the snow was very tiring - and note that I wrote 'in' instead of 'on' because the snow was pretty deep we literally walked in it) while enjoying the delicious cake.
Satisfied with the cake and our purchase (of chocolates), we made our way back to the car along Trakų gatvė and while walking on this road, we saw something not ordinary. There was a kiosk open!!! In this weather!!! When no tourists were around and most of the local people preferred to stay inside!!! And there was also a dog!!! A dog sitting outside in the snow!!! Maybe he was used to this kind of cold.
A kiosk in Trakai and a dog in front of it:
Wooden houses in Trakai:
We would have liked to stay longer but we still had a long drive ahead of us - 3 hours drive or 290 km to Klaipeda, a town situated at the mouth of the Curonian Lagoon where it flows into the Baltic Sea and Lithuania's only seaport.
It was only 16.30 when we arrived but it was already quite dark. Finding our hotel was not an easy task even with our navigation system. Our hotel's address was Žvejų gatvė 22 but it turned out that this street could not be reached via the usual route, which was to take Žvejų gatvė from Pilies gatvė, because there was an unfinished bridge and the hotel was on the other side of the bridge. We had to reach the hotel via a road across Daržų gatvė that led to the castle and eventually to the old port. This road did not have a name and did not show up on google map unless it was on the satellite mode.
When we finally found our hotel, we were tired and cold and we did not want anything else other than having dinner and then rest. So we checked in into our hotel as quickly as possible. The girl at the front desk was very friendly and she told us that they have put an extra portable heater in our room.
Feeling glad that we could finally have a warm place to sleep, we went to our room to find that it was very warm because of the extra heater. Don't get me wrong. We were grateful that we had a warm room to go to but we decided to turn off the extra heater because the regular heater, unlike the centrally regulated by state heating system in Vilnius, was more than sufficient for us.
After freshening up, made our way to a Chinese restaurant at Sukilėlių gatvė, which was our last destination for today.
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