• 2024 | baltics24,  europe,  lithuania,  vilnius

    Baltics24: Day 14 – Vilnius

    Our last full day in Vilnius, and indeed the Baltic states. Eastern Europe has apparently just one castle built on an island in a lake, and that’s in Lithuania at Trakai, about 20km out of Vilnius. Having travelled through Scotland several times, including just last year, I’ve seen my fair share of castles in lakes, it’s basically mandatory there to have a castle, or the ruins of one, wherever an island exists in a lake/loch. Mandatory, Bonnie Prince Charlie said so. Eastern Europe, not mandatory, maybe the folks at Trakai did it and then paid everyone else not to, so they’d be unique, or maybe in the Grand Duchy of…

  • 2023 | fifty years,  europe,  oban,  scotland,  skye,  uk

    Day 11: Portree, Oban (Connel)

    Was a busy day of stops and travelling, so I set my alarm for just after 7am, and of course was awake at 6am. Google told me that Cafe Arriba, place of yesterday’s full breakfast, would open at 8am, so figured that I’d be right to grab breakfast there once I packed and sorted everything. I don’t know if today was some sort of special Tuesday, but breakfast was not to be: nowhere serving hot food appeared to be open at 8am in Portree today. Not even at 8.10am, when I grabbed a bread roll and some cheese slices from the Co-op supermarket. While Skye is indeed beautiful, I’m leaning…