I wanted a change, so i went over the Iron Curtain...

So, I had a good winter in Ireland, it only rained twice, one for five months and the other for six, but who's counting?

I finished my contract in Galway, the good news is my boss might want me back for the second phase, the bad news? There is no bad news, I got a 22 Euro flight to Lithuania, which leads me up to today, well kind of..

The Iron curtain

 

 

I was cycling to the next town (place on the map) through a forest, on a bike path/road and I though...

Isn't Lithuania an awesome place for bike riding?

Yesterdays bike ride

When you think about it, you have trails by rivers, through forests, bike paths under bridges, you can get around, everything is spaced out like a tourist in Amsterdam and no one expects you to be a tourist, what I mean is, I'm one of a few, what I mean is, so far, I have met an English guy, one in the last 10 days, so we pretty much have the whole place to ourselves, oh bliss!!

Other things that are bliss.. Cepelinai, this is to die for

They also do a version of black pudding, no tomato sauce, I'd almost be afraid to ask for it, its definitely not in their culture.

I was telling the English guy from my dorm, for a country that was occupied for 49 years by the Nazis and Russians, they seem pretty normal, there doesn't seem to be much social problems?

In Vilnius, I went to the KGB prison, I was told by two people that the people preferred the Nazis to the Russians, if you can believe that?

One guy told me...

My grandmothers house was on the battle line, it changed frequently, so they had Nazis that came that were clean, polite, only took some stuff and the Soviets that were dirty, smelly, took everything, killed some one and raped someone, the Nazis were like angles in comparison

Tough stuff, try being normal after a war like that? And they only left in 1990, the population went from four million to 2.5 when they could travel

Oh they have problems, anti-social problems called Facebook, but not the homeless alcohol and drug stuff you see on the streets of Ireland, the rest of Europe, Australia and pretty much the rest of the world.

Trakai castle

For a country that I thought was poor, they seem to drive very good cars, I have never seen so many Porsche four wheel drives, you see them everywhere

 

A guy I met in Vilnius told me in the Ukraine you cannot believe all the expensive cars, so too in Romania, I was also told that "Money walks", as in they stash their money in off shore accounts like the people named in the Panama Papers and bring it in as they need it, and they need it!!

Like I was saying...

The first thing I learned about Lithuanian was, Lithuanian languages is the oldest living language of the Indo-European family, its as old as Sanskrit, and they still speak their own language, people in my own country, Ireland don't know their own?

I became a regular here, all due to some crazy guy behind me and I though it a good place to get off the street, Bingo!!!

I met a girl from Belarus that told me when the university in her own country closed, she moved to Vilnius and learned the language, got a job in an industry she loved, beer. It would make you think, how many people do you know would do the same, and Lithuanian is one of the hardest languages to learn?

No wonder, I met a guy from Romania that said people in Ireland are lazy and don't want to work? Amazing, some people can overcome any obstacle?

Kibinines, get them while they are hot!!

A guy in the hostel told me about pastries Kibinines, Trakai has the best, he would drive there for two, so I had three and a beer, and what an experience, but I prefer empanadas from South America

He also told me he killed people and we were shooting a BB gun at a tin can on the street one night?

Where you get he Kibinines

Next up, Latvia...