Day 20 - a Bizarre Theme Park - and a warning!

We got an early start on an overcast, but warm, morning as parking was reputed to be limited where we wanted to go, near Trakai Castle, about 15 miles from Vilnius. In fact it was fine and for the time we were there, cost €O.50. Although it’s classed as THE place to visit in Lithuania we chose to walk down the road and view the castle across the lake instead of going in. The light was behind it and I can’t get my new phone to adjust light the way the old one did, so my photos are poor.

We were heading south towards the Belarus border. After having been to the Ciurlionis gallery in Kaunas it seemed a good idea to follow the Ciurlionis road to the birthplace of this artist/musician at Druskininkai. Along the road there are many wooden carvings dedicated to him. Unfortunately we found only one with a parking spot near it.

We turned off to the Gruto Parkas, one of the most bizarre theme parks we’ve ever been to. We paid our €12 each and entered this place, busy with families. There was a playground, some fairground rides, ice cream vendors, exhibition halls, a few pens with rabbits, llamas, a solitary wallaby and some rhea as well as acres of pathway through Communist era statuary. The captions were in Lithuanian, Russian and English. All the statues, no longer venerated, had been removed from towns in Lithuania. We recognised a few but mainly they were of Lithuanians who had supported the Soviets regime in some way. One was of a woman, Maryte Melnikaite who had been shot aged 20 by the Germans in 1944 for subversive activities. I’m not sure why she didn’t warrant keeping her place. It was fascinating, especially the exhibition of Soviet memorabilia - medals, ration books, a library, flags, posters and newspapers going back almost 100 years. One was about the meeting between Stalin, Roosevelt and Churchill at Yalta.

We just made it to the car park where we ate our sandwich before the rain started. Then we embarked on the drive north-west to Poland. We had crossed the border by 2.30. The Lithuanian zone between Russia and Belarus to get to Poland isn’t that wide, hence possibly the reason for the message below.

The big excitement of the day was when we crossed into Poland this messsge came up on my phone - “Warning! BAN on staying in the Polish area near the Belarus border. Unauthorized crossing is forbidden. Soldiers may use weapons. Turn back immediately!”

News from home - #3 daughter had a batch of very poor papers so they didn’t take long to mark which meant she could go to listen to #2 daughter’s choir. The children were camping out in the garden of Ella’s friend Daniel. His parents are Hong Kong Chinese and his dad plays the bagpipes. (I know this from chatting to him at Ella’s birthday). They ate Chinese hot pot.

233 miles today