Day 22 - 07 July 2018 -Vilnius, LT to Malbork, Poland

We ate breakfast and packed up the bike and were able to leave around 10am. We retraced our incoming route to Augustnow, Poland using mainly small 2 lane roads. The weather was clear and that was much appreciated. From Augustnow we continued west toward Gdansk. There was ample amounts of road construction and unsigned detours which didn't help keeping a fast pace. The last 40 or 50 miles were on a pretty fast 4 lane freeway type road before the turn west to Malbork.

At Malbork we found our hotel with a little help from a local. We were assigned a ground floor room with offstreet parking for the motorcycle. We could see the Malbork castle from our hotel and there was a prison across the street along with a pizza joint and an ATM. We unpacked and enjoyed a pizza at the Pappa's restaurant across the street before retiring after a long day. We had 1/2 of a pizza left, so that became breakfast for the next 2 breakfasts!

Day 21 - 06 July 2018 -Vilnius, LT - Day 4 - Performance Day

The day had finally come for the choir's performance with the mass choir. We didn't have to be to the meeting point until 2pm, so Angela and I headed off walking first to the central market and then wandering the streets of Old Town. The most interesting part of the walk was when we stumbled upon the artists colony with all sorts of pianos as part of displays. There was even one in the river! We found a bench along the river and had a little picnic lunch.  

We found the group at what we were told was the meeting point. A little while later another choir member came up to us and said the meeting point was changed to a little further away. So we moved there. I was told I couldn't walk with the choir in the parade to the fairgrounds, so I walked off and made great progress in walking to the venue location where I found a good vantage point from which I used our GOPRO to video many of the groups that passed by until some 2 hours later the Choral Sounds NW group finally showed up. From there I made my way into the seating area in from of the amphitheater. At the security check I was totally surprised that I couldn't take in my little remaining portion of potato chips. All I got was a stern "NO FOOD!". Later I saw lots of people with food that they must have snuck in. There was no firearms or other contraband check! Just food!

The concert was wonderful although I couldn't understand a word of it. It lasted about 3 1/2 hours and there was certainly a great display of patriotism in the final few numbers. Even the President of Lithuania was there and she greeted the crowd. And all too soon it was over.

We met at the meeting point and then made our way to the bus which whisked us to the center of the Old Town where we enjoyed a late dinner at the Casa Number 4 restaurant before sharing an UBER ride back to the hotel at 12:30am. Others were staying on to party and do kareoke. For us, tomorrow would be a long day as we decided to see the Malbork Castle in Malbork which is some 333 miles west of Vilnius. Due to the road conditions, it would be over an 8 hour ride, but would it be dry?  

Day 20 - 05 July 2018 -Vilnius, LT - Day 3 - Full Day Practice

Today was a full day of practice for the choir so Dan and I went first to the Tolerance Museum which had a large collection of Jewish art along with a few fragments from the former Grand Synagogue which the Nazi's blew up in WWII. From there we walked to the Holocaust Museum and saw more chilling evidence of the atrocities that were committed against the Lithuanian Jewish population.  

Following a nice BBQ ribs lunch, we walked to the main market and then to the Train Museum which is housed in the main train depot. Unfortunately we got there too late to view the outside exhibits, but we were able to see the inside collection. What was particularly fascinating for me was the collection of hand powered hacksaws and drills used to cut and drill railroad track. That's a lot of hand labor!! After we returned late in the day, I somewhat caught up on my YouTube videos before answering a request to have dinner with a choir member who could not stay at the venue all day because of physical limitations. My salad was nice and we enjoyed a fun time together.

Angela got back around 10:30 and we caught up on each other's day.

Day 19 - 04 July 2018 -Vilnius, LT - Day 2 -

This day in Vilnius was a split one. For the first half we went by coach to the island castle at Trakai which was about 45 minutes west of Vilnius. It's a beautiful old brick castle that has been wonderfully conserved with lots of interesting exhibits. After visiting the castle we enjoyed a progressive lunch involving two restaurants. At the first we had a traditional item of Kabinas (a pork and potato stuffed pastry not unlike a calzone) and at the second restaurant a very nice chicken noodle soup was enjoyed.

We were also able to view some very old watercraft that were on display. Since the second half of the day was a practice time for the choir, the bus dropped them off at the venue and took the remaining spouses back to the hotel where another spouse, Dan, and I walked to the nearest LIDL discount grocery store. Afterwards I came back and worked on my blog and waited for Angela to return about 9:15pm.

Day 18 - 03 July 2018 -Vilnius, LT - Day 1

Our first full day in Vilnius was to be a total tourist day with no real Choir activities planned. So we got up and had a quick breakfast at the hotel. Strangely enough, nobody checked to see if anyone was supposed to getting a meal. Promptly at 9am we boarded our bus for the day's touring which started with a tour through Vilnius. We visited a number places that we had visited on our previous trip although on this trip we didn't get to go into most of them like we did 2 years ago. There were lots of Lithuanians in full ethnic costume throughout the city and especially around the main square and the various churches as they were practicing and preparing for the upcoming song festival which the choir that Angela sings in will also be performing. That choir represents that largest group from America singing in the festival.

From Vilnius we drove to Kaunas which is about an hour away by motor coach. There we did another bus tour of the city before heading off on a walking tour of the old city and had lunch. Angela and I also met up with a cousin of the best man in our wedding and she joined us for lunch as well as a brief part of the walking tour. Rima is an ESL teacher so she and Angela hit it off immediately. When it came time for us to reboard our bus we said our goodbyes to Rima and were on our way for a tour of the historic open air village of Rumsiskes. This village dates to the 17th and 18th centuries and consists of a number of preserved houses and barns and at least one windmill. Several of the homes were open for us to tour. Leaving the village, we headed back to Vilnius where we were dropped off in front of City Hall.  

We had a little over an hour to find dinner or do whatever else we wished to do before the performance started at the theater that we were to attend. Angela and I just walked around and were in our seats for the performance which started just after 8pm. Everything was said, sung, or printed in Lithuanian. Angela volunteered to me, "Just think you are a Russian soldier during the occupation. They didn't understand either." The performance consisted a many acts involving over several hundred people and progressed smoothly and had interesting transitions. The groups were in sizes from 4 to 20 people. Some played instruments, some sang to the accompaniment of their instruments, and some were accompanied by a small band. One group's rendition in Lithuanian of Shenandoah was emotionally very chilling (in a very good sense). For the last 3 or 4 numbers, all of the groups sang in unison and filled the stage and the side aisles. Those anthems were very powerful and evoked strong audience participation.

After the performance, we walked back to our hotel in a driving rainstorm. Rain seems to be a continuing theme of this year's trip. Fortunately we did have our umbrellas so the only parts that really go wet were our pants legs. That would be fixed by an overnight drying session. And so by 11:30pm we were ready for bed and some needed rest. Tomorrow is planned to have another tour in the morning and the choir does its first practice for 5 1/2 hours from 3pm to 8:30pm.

Day 17 - 02 July 2018 - Warsaw, PL to Vilnius, Lithuania

Sometimes the best laid plans of mice and men go astray. And so went our day today. The plan was to ride from Warsaw, Poland to Vilnius, Lithuania in a ride that was projected to be about 6 hours via a direct route there. It wasn't far out of Warsaw the the first challenge occurred. There was a major set of construction delays with long traffic lines for almost 25 miles with no exit opportunities. Once we inched our way through that, our planned road was totally closed due to construction, so I had to plan a detour route as the locals don't provide one. The only detour I could work out was about 40 miles out of our way to the west and then back east. And by now, the rain had started and persisted off and on throughout the day (mostly on). We encountered periodic construction zones and probably the high point of the day was seeing lots of storks throughout the ride.

Then came error and delay number two. The GPS routed us up Route 19 direct to Vilnius. However, I didn't note that the route passed through Belarus. When we got to the border, there was a huge backup that wasn't going anywhere. I lane split to near the start of the line and a helpful Belarussian fellow advised us that the correct way to get to Vilnius without passing through Belarus was to backtrack and take the #8 road towards Kaunus. So we turned around and headed back into Poland to find the other road. At least we can say, "We've now seen Belarus!". More rain accompanied us as we rode the 20 miles back south to the Road #8 junction and then turned back north. At Augustow, we were directed onto the 16 Road and it turned out to be a wonderful road pretty much free of the large trucks we had spent much of the earlier part of day with. The rain let up for much of this segment of the ride and we motored our way into Vilnius and found our hotel, Comfort Inn II which has secure underground parking. We parked and checked in and found our group just finishing dinner. Fortunately there was food left for us, so we joined the group for a little dinner and chatted with another couple (Shirley & Dan) about our travels as they are visiting some of the same places we have visited.

After dinner we unpacked the bike and hung up all of our wet clothes and washed a load of laundry and caught the last of the Belgium-Japan World Cup Soccer game (Belgium won 3-2) For today, it was a 11 hour, 550 plus mile day of challenging riding in the forms of road construction, rain, GPS routing difficulties. But I guess that's why we both have Iron Butt Association ride certifications. And now to kick back for a week in Vilnius.  

Day 16 - 01 July 2018 - Warsaw, PL

Today we did something different than we have ever done on one of our previous motorcycle trips. We hailed an Uber ride from the hotel to the Central Railway Station so that we wouldn't have to hassle with parking (it's a real issue in Warsaw). while waiting for our UBER ride, we noted 2 Gold Wing motorcycles in our hotel's parking lot with Russian plates. And one of them was a 2018 model. The UBER worked really slick and only cost about $8US. At the Railway station we looked for the Hop On Hop Off (HOHO) bus location and a tourist information lady assisted us and pointed out where it was located. With that settled, we enjoyed a quick and inexpensive breakfast at McDonald's in the train station. We caught the 10:30am RED line bus and enjoyed a brief chat with a Colombian couple who had just returned from Russia after watching two Colombian World Cup Soccer games. They were on an extended layover before continuing on their journey back to the US where they live.

Riding the Red Line HOHO gave us a good initial understanding of the city layout. We hoped to ride the blue line, but in the end that didn't work out because of what we chose to do after riding the Red Line bus. BTW, this HOHO bus was the cheapest of any we've taken in the world. After doing the loop, we got off in the Old Town and hopped on a little train for a more intimate ride. Then we walked the OLD City and enjoyed a Polish lunch before deciding to walk over to the Jewish Museum to take a 2 hour guided tour of the history of the Polish Jews. It was about a mile walk there but the tour was so worth it. After the tour we walked another mile and a half to the Chopin Museum and it was free because it was Sunday. The Chopin music playing in the various exhibits was wonderful. We then hailed another Uber for a ride back to our hotel. There we ate a nice Polish meal for dinner and watched the Croatia-Denmark World Cup soccer game.

Tomorrow we head for Vilnius, Lithuania and it's expected to be at least a 6 hour ride to cover 440 kilometers or some 270 miles. Some of Angela's choir members have already arrived there, but we don't need to be there until 8pm for a group dinner.