One man and his horn

You'd be impressed if I told you that I left my hotel room at 0530 UK time and returned at 2330 Lithuanian time. As it happens, of course, you can take two hours off that for the time difference. But you get the idea. A long day.

Concluded by a slightly surreal experience of being taken by coaches out to Le Meridien Vilnius, which is reputedly one of the most luxurious hotels in the Baltic area, and is a resort/golf complex nearly 20 kms outside Vilnius. The bit we saw - the banqueting bit - didn't look especially luxurious and the fittings in the ladies loos were pretty 'tired'. The food was adequate, the company good. But the folkloric entertainment was first class, led by this man and his daudyte - or so my researches tell me this is called. It makes a pretty rich sound, I can assure you.

I wonder how many times that folk dancing and music troupe have had to trot out their performance for the delectation of foreigners during Lithuania's time holding the presidency of the Council of the European Union. Quite a few, I would wager...