Day 35 - The Heights of Tourism in Vilnius

It was not the best night’s sleep last night as it turns out that the walls where I am staying are made of paper, and the person in the room next door to mine was dreaming about motorbikes (or, in more common parlance, snored like a trooper!). I did however, get the benefit of a hotel breakfast. Whilst it would not have won any awards from most people, I was very, very happy with my cereal, fruit juice, and pastries! I was well fuelled for my day of adventuring.

I walked down to the Old Town, and very much meandered through the old cobbled streets, enjoying the little shops, geocaches, and old buildings. Pilies Street is known as being the main ‘tourist street’ and it did not disappoint.

Pilies Street took me down to the Cathedral, and a rather wonderful statue of a knight, which I obviously said ‘Ni’ to!

Next to the cathedral is the bell tower, which one can climb. Obviously, I did! I did particularly enjoy the fact that I was introduced to the history of the bell tower by an animated pigeon.

Out of all the tower climbs I have done so far, I think this is the first that gave me slightly wobbly legs; I think it was the fact that you could always see the other levels (a.k.a where you would fall!) through the wooden steps! The views from the top were a little disappointing as there is mesh over the windows, but I loved the fact that you really did get to see the bells up close. I did make sure to time my climbs up the scary steps to when the bells were not chiming.

After the bell tower, I went into the cathedral itself. Mass was just taking place, so I sat at the back and enjoyed being part of the service. Even without any Lithuanian of note, I did manage to kind of follow what was going on, and enjoyed the violin music.

Top of my ‘to see’ list for today was Gediminas Tower, which sits on a hill overlooking the city. I was going to take the funicular that I had heard was available, but the hill wasn’t actually too bad, so I walked up (Shout out to my brother, Matt, for sending me a gif of Kate Bush’s ‘Running up that hill’ as I went). I then obviously had to go into the tower itself, with lots of medieval history inside, and climb that too. The views were certainly worth it though!

It was then back to Pilies Street to find a snack to see me through to dinner. And an ice-cream in one of the pretty squares!

I had lots of options of where to go to next, but decided to take a scenic extended route back to my hotel, via the Church of Casimir. I did think about going up St John’s church tower today too, but decided I had done enough climbing for one day.

I therefore headed back to my hotel and had an excellent read of my book and nap before heading out for dinner at a lovely restaurant nearby.

It is another parkrun tomorrow - the only one in the Baltics - and it is apparently slightly hilly; so at least I have trained for it today!