It wasn’t surprising that there weren’t so many bicycle tourists in Belarus. But then we crossed into Schengen, into the EU, into Latvia’s Upper Daugava River valley, a UNESCO World Heritage Site with a marked bicycle route all the way to Daugavpils. It will be crowded with tourists, I’m sure.
The Daugava River forms the Latvia-Belarus border for the first ~20km that we pedaled west along the north side of the river. Getting late in the day we found a decent place to pitch the tents and hadn’t been there five minutes when the border patrol showed up and shooed us along. The man kindly pointed out that the special border patrol area ended at the Indrica Stream — “pass that and you can camp without a problem,” he advised.
It was only about 4km to that stream, but our road looked like this at times:
Just passed the Indrica Stream a kind farmer led us down to his land next to the river. “Camp here,” he offered. Fantastic, thank you. Welcome to Latvia.
It was good riding through here but more pretty forest than river views. The road was slower than we expected, but the expected crowds of tourists did not materialize.
Krāslava is the only place that might count as a city. We camped at the quiet village of Tartaks.
The next day we were in Daugavpils. I was very excited to see the architecture.
Look familiar? No, probably not, but it’s what we saw in Kars, what they called “Baltic architecture”, and sure enough, it exists in the Baltics! How fun is that.
Maybe food is more exciting? Latvia’s kartupelu pankukas:
Or perhaps alcohol? Riga Black Balsam cured Catherine the Great.
Well, Ebru, Ferda, and I enjoyed our short day in Daugavpils. We rode south, and I got a flat tire just before crossing into Lithuania where we found a brilliant lakeside campsite at ež. Baltas.
We chatted with locals who came for a swim, and they returned with cucumbers and apples for us.
Soon we discovered what would plague us through Lithuania — too much traffic on the paved roads and too much washboard on the dirt roads (often with traffic as well). However, this part of Lithuania is full of lakes and rather pretty. It reminded Ferda and me of southern Sweden.
At Paalksnė we found our favorite campsite of the trip and ended up staying two nights — the ducks, the butterflies, the trees, the clouds, the mushrooms, the dragonflies. On the second evening a local family brought us non-alcohol beer (really good), kvas, chocolate, biscuits, mineral water, and of course apples — always apples.
The next day was one of our longer days though, except for about 5km, we managed to stay off the main road. We had a couple church visits and late in the afternoon, using a translate app, asked a kind couple (in Russian) to camp in their large yard next to the forest. There were too many mosquitoes. A day or two earlier was the coldest of the trip (so far), but this morning (and the only time during the whole trip) we complained of being too hot as soon as the sun hit our camp!
The historic center of Vilnius is another UNESCO site, but we never managed to find the city’s soul.
More Baltic architecture:
Literatų g. with plaques celebrating Lithuanian authors (or authors who had something to do with Lithuania?) is one of Vilnius’ tourist attractions.
The Gothic façade of St. Anne’s Church has remained unchanged for 500 years.
There are other churches to be visited as well.
When planning this trip, I had read about the painting of three-headed St. Casimir in one of the churches (perhaps the eponymous church above?), but my search was in vain until I happened until this copy at the Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania:
It’s not a three-headed saint at all! It’s a three-handed saint. Hahaha, kind of a disappointment. The Ducal Palace was worth a visit.
My favorite site in Vilnius was the university. I’ll start with two photos of the exterior,
but the best thing at Vilnius University were the Petras Repšys murals in the vestibule of the Lithuanian Philology Center.
Uh, yeah, what just happened there?
We said goodbye to Ebru. She flew back to Antalya to go back to work.
But Özgür joined us in Vilnius so we’re still three as we continue our Baltic escapades.
Nice architecture!