Today has been a good day. Work went very well and very productive in all areas, but where the day came into its own was after work and after the normal bit of urgent stuff I had to do before I allowed myself some time to go out around the town.
Two colleagues joined me and we had a very pleasant evening walking around the old town area and as both of my colleagues are locals they could give me full details of the history of the town and knew exactly where to walk.
First we left the hotel and walked through to an excellent looking huge white church at which point my first bit of trivia was imparted whereby the town has around one hundred churches. The square that was outside the church was equally as impressive with the usual bars and cafes surrounding. We continued to walk and came to another big church and a royal palace which I have been told has never had royalty living there. We past the remainder of the castle and through a park toward an area of the town that is actually an independent state, albeit done for fun the state has its own constitution and even has an independence day. Along here we saw another nice church of which I took a photo and at the side a smaller tower type building. We crossed a number of bridges and each bridge had padlocks that had been attached to the bridge with the names of lovers written on them. I was told that this is quite common in European towns but I had to admit I have not seen it before.
We left the independent state and rejoined Vilnius and walked toward the town square which again are full of impressive buildings. In between all this are more churches and one in particular that I didn’t take a photo because as I was been told about it, a passing lady commented that the church is a “personal church”, not sure what she meant but she did say that when she had gone in she had been asked to leave which is a strange thing for a church.
We continued to walk and then came to very nice old Russian Church and that is my final photograph, it is the photograph with the four cars parked in front. We then met some colleagues from the same company as us, they recommended a little cafe which was hidden behind a wall and we had a drink sat in the late evening sunshine and some very nice chat.
After this we walked back along the road to the hotel and I was pointed toward a little courtyard that tomorrow will be having some music and entertainment so my thoughts are to make my way down there tomorrow to see what is happening.
Overall it has been a nice evening with pleasant company.
A couple of things that I have not got used to and noticed more than in the other countries I have been in, is the way you cross the roads, normally you stand at a crossing and wait for a car to stop or gap in the traffic and cross but here the pedestrian has the right of way and the way to cross is simply to step out and cross and see if the cars stop, and in one case a car literally skidded to a halt but at least it stopped.
Also today I saw my first traffic accident in Lithuania, as I was waiting for my taxi to leave the site and a couple of cars came to a halt with one embedding the remains of his front into the side of another. Looking at the driving I am amazed I have only seen that minor accident in the time I have been here as I saw four near misses just in the taxi I was in as I travelled the five kilometres from the office to the hotel.
But as I am back at the hotel and feeling tired after being up early and not getting much sleep due to the time difference it is now time for
Night all
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