two backpacks and a diaper bag

Wednesday, March 21st. Vilnius. Last night Arthur woke up at least 4 times. The longest stretch of sleep we got was about 2 hours. When it was finally quite bright outside, Sean and I felt so exhausted. We wanted more sleep, but the light of day made it more difficult to put Arthur back to sleep.

So we got up slowly, got ready, and made a plan to walk around Old Town.

Our apartment was in the middle of Old Town, right next to the City Hall. Very convenient location. We decided to first head south and make a loop clockwise.

There are lots of churches in Vilnius. According to a local guidebook, it’s about one church per 700 people. As we walked around, we stumbled across different churches with various facade and history.

We first headed to the Gate of Dawn, a pilgrim destination. There is an icon of the Virgin Mary that is supposed to have miraculous power to grant wishes.

Then we head towards Hales Market. The market was not nearly as big as Riga’s Central Market. It was probably comparable to the one in Tallinn, though.

Arthur woke up from his nap while we were there. So we sat at a cafe inside the market, bought a cup of coffee, and fed him. We tried to put him to sleep again but it didn’t work. So we continued to walk around the market. When we were ready to go, we tried to put Arthur to sleep again, but he refused. About 5 minutes after we left the market, he was fussy and we stopped by the side of the street under some random gate to a courtyard to put him to sleep.

Then we continued to walk towards the Franciscan church. On the way there, we passed by a Sculpture Yard.

I honestly thought it was going to be pretty cool since it was inside an open-air courtyard. It turned out to be just okay. There were only 4 sculptures there. No explanation.

As an aside, the street art around town (not the graffiti) was pretty cool.

We continued on walking towards the Presidential Palace, but of course, we passed by a couple more churches along the way.

This church has a small park next to it. So peaceful.

Passing by the Presidential Palace, we arrived at Vilnius Cathedral and it’s massive Square.

One of the tiles on the square is a Stebuklas tile, which is a “miracle” tile that marked an inspiring event in 1989 when two million people from the three Baltic countries (Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania) formed a continuous human chain stretching 650 km across the three countries in protest against Soviet occupation.

It took us a while to find this tile. We walked round and round the Square. It turned out to be located in between the cathedral and the bell tower.

Since Arthur was still asleep, we decided to continue walking towards Uzupis Republic. On the way, we passed by Pilies Street and Literatu Street with its ode to the local artists.

Passing by St. Anna and Bernardine church, we finally got to Uzupis Republic.

Uzupis is a district in Lithuania but its residents declared Uzupis an independent republic on April 1, 1997. It’s a bit hippie and it reminds me of Berkeley.

We didn’t spend that long in Uzupis. Just a quick walk through the district and then we went to the Bastion.

And the final loop took us back to the center where we headed to Restaurant Rene based on our Airbnb owner’s recommendation.

Arthur was still asleep when we got to the restaurant.

We had cheese platter and mussels.

There was a small lobster inside the mussels pot.

The cool thing about having an early dinner/late lunch was that we practically had the whole restaurant to ourselves.

Arthur finally woke up right before dessert and he stayed awake through the end of the meal and when we went to the supermarket before we head home.

At night, Arthur woke up, yet again, many times.

When we finally decide to get out of bed this morning, we still felt so exhausted from the lack of sleep these past two nights. Sean and I felt like zombies.

And yet, as Arthur was being burped by Sean, he smiled at me. I smiled back. My heart just melted. I couldn’t be mad at this little boy. He didn’t know any better. Maybe he, too, was tired of waking up many times during the night.

Sean and I decided to head to the Museum of Genocide Victims today.

It was a long walk through Gedimino Street. Along the way, we passed by the National Theatre.

Arthur woke up about two blocks away from the museum. We decided to not stop along the way. Instead, we opened up his cocoon to let him feel the cold air. We didn’t seem to mind. But at some point, he became more fussy. I gave him his giraffe toy. That seemed to buy us some time. His cry progressively got louder as we approached the museum. Once we got there, we took him out of the stroller. Then he got quiet. It seemed he only wanted to be held.

The museum was not wheelchair accessible so we had to lug the stroller up a set of stairs. Then we took out the carrier and placed Arthur in it.

We walked around the first floor with Arthur in the carrier facing out. He stayed quiet throughout the whole first floor. He seemed to be enjoying the exhibition as well.

Then when we got to the second floor, he started to become fussy. It was time to feed him.

After I fed him, I checked his diaper. Sure enough, it was time to change him. The diaper even leaked to the front. Maybe it was because of his posture on the carrier? Nevertheless, I had to clean him up real well.

We tried to put him to sleep on the car seat after the feeding and the diaper change, but he wasn’t cooperating. So I decided to just carry him to the second floor, hoping that when I sway and rock him, he would fall asleep.

It worked. He fell asleep as we walked through the second floor exhibition.

We continued walking around through the second floor, and then to the basement exhibition for the KGB prison.

When we completed the visit, we placed Arthur back in the stroller and left the building. He was still asleep.

We decided to walk towards the river before heading back to Old Town.

More churches.

Before heading back home, we decided to have a meal at Forto Dvaras for some Lithuanian cuisine.

We ended the day early so we could do laundry and pack. It was a short day but it was still exhausting. Not having a good night’s rest can sure make daytime traveling harder.