Vilnius

We took a four hour bus ride across Lithuania to Vilnius. Vilnius is where Lesley’s maternal great grandfather Nathan Takefman is from. Nathan immigrated to Canada with his family when he was a teenager c. 1910. We decided to rent an apartment for a week in Vilnius because a) we wanted to do some research on the Takefman’s and b) after our apartment stay in Copenhagen, we realized how nice it was to have a home base. Out of a train station brochure, we scored this sweet apartment from Regina of Regina House. She is a lovely woman who lives around the corner and rents several apartments in the Old Town.

Our courtyard.












The front of our apartment building (we forgot to take any pictures inside)









The neighborhood, you’ll notice that Vilnius has charming churches everywhere.









A didelis (big) potato pancake, at a cute little underground tavern. Vilnius has quite a few of these cave-dwellings for a café, a beer, a snack, maybe more. They are charming.












One of the main drags in the old town










Vilnius is rapidly becoming a hip, European city. All over the city there are places like Cozy where we had our first dinner—fusion, Mediterranean, dj’s, candles, style, really nice food--inhabiting the old, Baroque buildings.
























Uzupio, a neighborhood on an island just east of Old Town. They’ve declared their independence and have a nice constitution posted along the main square, with everything from “everyone has a right to live by the river” to “no one has the right to make someone else feel guilty.”









The locks on this bridge into Uzupio were put here by couples as a symbol of their unbreakable union.









Uzupio’s central piazza












With the old churches, cobblestones, terra cotta tile, and the obvious dolce vita of the people, Vilnius feels a lot like an Italian city. They have good pizza too .









And lovely cafes where you can grab a coffee or a light lunch.












This is Joe’s favorite place to eat in the whole world: Pilies Kepyklete. Seriously, we came back three times..










The “refreshing salad”—grapes, cucumber, lettuce, feta, olives, tomatoes, pumpkin seeds, and a few ribbons of melon, all with a light vinaigrette.












Mushroom dumplings with sour cream—they look heavy but these were truly pillows, filled with wild mushroom ragu, the sour cream melted by the heat of the dumplings.












Meat crepe---imagine a crepe filled with a bolognese sauce, sour cream on the side. My oh my.












And to top it all off, two perfect espressos and a walnut pastry—a tart shell filled with the freshest walnuts lightly drizzled with caramel.









The place.









Vilnius University, a Jesuit university and Eastern Europe’s oldest founded in the late 1500’s. It’s a beautiful campus inside old town, with 13 courtyards surrounded by baroque buildings.












The main cathedral and bell tower









Brick baroque









Typical Vilnius street












Working on the blog we were forced to get late night grub. Burger House, not bad.












Burger House’s artwork









This is how they sell roses at the flower market.









The State Historical Archives north of town. We applied for a copy of my great-grandfather’s birth certificate here. Without knowing the specific synagogue that he belonged to, it may be hard to find. We’re hoping to return to the States to find a copy in our pile of mail.

In Vilnius, we first discovered the joy of communicating via photographs. Since our Lithuanian is quite limited (we have a basic phrase book), we tracked down the appropriate state archive office by flashing a photo of my great grandfather, me pointing to it and then to me, and then saying father’s father’s father (‘vater’ was the only family term we knew at that point). In addition to leading us further along our path, this stragey typically resulted in beautiful, brief connections and smiles.

They like smoked fish.









The sales girls where Lesley found a sweet pair of boots and Joe found a sweet wallet.










Main square old town









A lunch of soup on a rainy day---beef stew for Joe and sour cream of onion for Les. Les’ had hers with a cup of ciaocollato, an espresso cup filled with thick chocolate, maybe cocoa, sugar and cream. It was a day of cream for Les..












The indoor market









Dinner at a french bistro: Endive salad with hard-boiled egg and chicken liver pate on toast. Steak frites and veal medallions with vegetables and a mushroom sauce. We enjoyed a nice bottle of wine and the interesting music selection (Guns N Roses’ Appetite for Destruction)
























Back to our favorite place for coffee, Lithuanian brandy, and a treat. As if we needed a treat (did we mention we are on our honeymoon?)












An absolutely stunning fall day. We climbed the hill to the old Gediminus Castle.




































View of Vilnius from the top of the castle tower


Traveling in the fall is very special—changing leaves, crisp days, large appetites.

Being in Vilnius for a week, we looked into some of the local cultural activities. We got tickets to the state opera house’s performance of Verdi’s La Balla Maschera (The Masked Ball). Standby tickets were $5—by standby they mean standing, but everyone sat in aisles once the performance started.












A pre-performance aperitif.

A full house. The artistic direction was quite modern—chain link fence, guns, futuristic masquerade costumes. It was great—several hours of musical fantasy and dedicated artistry. We floated out of the theatre.

…and filled ourselves with mussels and frites and really strong belgian beer at Rene’s









A typical way Vilnius’ians take lunch is in small cafeteria-style buffets/coffee and pastry shops where one can mix and match from a selection of prepared foods (and get dessert to boot). This is one such place.









Everything is priced by weight, so you can get just what you want. In this case, we got a stuffed cabbage with a scoop of mashed potatoes and a dollop of sour cream, a little carrot salad, a little cabbage salad, one chicken kiev, a slice of brown bread, and a taste each of the two casseroles of the day—a savory strata and a noodle dish.









One of Lithuania’s national dishes are ceppelani’s, translated into zeppelins. As in blimps. You can see why. The texture is somewhat gelatinous gnocchi, stuffed with meat, topped with sour cream, and pork crackling sauce. There were two….

You’ll notice that the blog is increasingly focused on food, what better way is there to experience a culture.