Vilnius, Lithuania

The bus cooled down and the chair went back far enough to make for a comfortable nights sleep. There was an annoying high pitched man sitting behind Roy who kept making a fuss when Roy reclined his seat. I thought he must have extra long legs or some disability, but on reaching Vilnius, we realised while he pushed in front of everyone to get his bag first, that he was just annoyingly precious and wanted the person in front of him to be the only person on the bus spending the night in an upright position. You do meet some characters travelling.
We disembarked and found a toilet, only to realise you had to slot in a coin to use it. Such an inhospitable place. Warsaw also charged Roy as much for a pee as the coffee which created it :)  There had been a toilet on the bus but every time I tried to use it, it was locked because we were in town. No idea why. But I'm sure this is more detail than anyone is interested in.
The man at the baggage lockers kindly gave me enough for us both.  Relieved, we walked to the train station over the road, drew cash and put our luggage in a large coin operated locker.
Again, we walked to what is called the old town.

Note all the ice - it's getting cold!

Gates of dawn

The streets were empty I think Europe only wakes after 9.

Streets of Vilnius

Some sweet chickens we saw in a shop window. I later bought myself an amber heart (for a necklace) at this shop.

This restaurant looked appealing, so we went in for coffee.

Mmm, good lavazza coffee. Healthy smoothie, omelette and chicken broth. Think we could spend all day here.

After a long breakfast we walked up to view the castle which was a bit dull although the view was good.

Not much of a castle

We then went to the KGB / victims of Holocaust museum but it was closed. We walked past all the fancy clothing shops. Needed to replace the shirt Roy forgot in UK, but typically,  I got a new shirt, not Roy.  I loved this statue outside an optometrists.

Feeling tired, we found a nice Lithuania restaurant where we had a late lunch.

Lunch

Roys was a smoked piece of chicken cooked inside a potato pie. Was very tasty. The Lithuania beers were ok.
To stop ourselves falling asleep we walked to the market in the square,  but there wasn't much, so we are back in the coffee shop again.

Same coffee shop after dark

Will walk back to the station in an hours time.

We had no problems catching the train.  There were plush carpets down the passages. Our lady conductor spoke no English, but someone on the platform translated for me. We had booked second class for this leg as it was short and substantially cheaper, but while the train seemed half empty, we were already 3 in our compartment with another person soon to join. I asked her if it was possible to move to an empty carriage. She looked very stern and it sounded like she was saying no, but she was really helpful and moved the other guys out of our compartment so nobody was more than 2 per compartment. It was great! There was a toilet but no shower. Thank goodness for the Dove deodorant Jess gave me.

Train from Vilnius, Lithuania,  to St Petersburg,  Russia

The one man who was moved from our room spoke perfect English, from Lithuania, and we chatted with him a while. We filled out are immigration cards, had some cambembert from France and naartjies from Vilnius (we gave our conductor some as we read Russians like gifting). We fell into a much needed deep sleep.