The Baltics (Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia), June 16 - 22, 2014

We reached Vilnius, Lithuania's capital, on Monday after an 8-hour drive from Gdansk through the Mazurian Lakes and many small towns. There we checked into the Hotel Apia, a 12-room establishment two blocks from the Presidential Palace. Our accommodations on this trip have usually been hotels from international chains, especially the Accor Group; but this time Hotels.com, our usual booking agent, offered an attractive rate at the Apia. We were somewhat doubtful, especially since the hotel was located in the midst of Vilnius’s maze of narrow streets, but our accommodations turned out to be a large attractively furnished two-room suite. The parking was secure and very convenient, and breakfast was provided in the barrel-vaulted cellars of a very upscale neighboring hotel. Occasionally, we found, it pays to take a chance and break free from the low-risk standardization offered by the international hotel chains.

Vilnius is an unusually compact city, and the Apia was less than a 15-minute walk from everything we wanted to see.   We couldn’t miss the Presidential Palace, which flies the flags of Lithuania, the European Union, and NATO.   We saw the NATO flag in Latvia as well—analogous, perhaps, to a sign on an American home warning that the house is protected by ADT.

Presidential Palace, Vilnius

Just beyond the Palace is a large square with the classically designed cathedral and its belfry, the remaining tower of the Upper Castle, and the reconstructed grand ducal Palace, now a national history museum.  A visitor to the museum can carefully trace Lithuanian history up to the end of the 16^th century, when relations between the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, previously joined in a semi-union, started to go sour.  The rest of the country’s history is not portrayed, perhaps for diplomatic reasons: inter alia, Poland’s annexation of Vilnius after World War I remains a delicate matter between the two neighboring members of NATO and the European Union.

Vilnius cathedral and belfry

Erstwhile grand ducal palace

Remaining battlement of Upper Castle

No such restraint existed at the so-called KGB Museum, formally known as the Museum of Genocide Victims.  All three Baltic states have such museums, which describe the gruesome experiences their citizens suffered under German and Soviet occupation.  However, the Vilnius version is much more evocative, for it includes visits to the cells, interrogation rooms, and execution chamber used by the German and Soviet services.

German/Soviet interrogation facilities in Vilnius

Museum of the Occupation, Riga, Latvia

We were fortunate to visit Vilnius University, the oldest in the Baltics (founded in 1579), just after graduation ceremonies had ended at St. John’s Church on the campus.  The campus itself occupies several blocks in downtown Vilnius and is organized into a series of courtyards associated with the various faculties.  The graduates pictured below were celebrating in the Great Courtyard, the university’s center.

Riga, Latvia’s capital, is situated on the Baltic coast like Gdansk and Tallinn and shared with them membership in the Hanseatic League and the resulting architectural influences obvious in all three cities.  The obvious examples in Riga include St. Peter’s Church and the Dome Cathedral, reportedly the largest house of worship in the Baltics.  (There we attended a mid-day concert performed on the church’s magnificent organ, concluded by the Widor "Toccata.")   Most striking, however, was the House of Blackheads, the headquarters of a guild of unmarried foreign merchants known for their riotous parties—sort of a medieval frat house.

Dome Church

Interior of Dome Church

House of Blackheads

Soviet monuments appear in all three Baltic republics, including Riga’s Latvian Riflemen Monument.  Erected during the Soviet occupation, the statue commemorates a company of Latvian soldiers in Russia’s World War I army who defected to the Bolsheviks.  Some became Lenin’s most trusted troops.  Needless to say, controversy surrounds the continued existence of the monument, which occupies a prominent position in downtown Riga.

Latvian Riflemen Monument

Perhaps the loveliest part of Riga is the so-called Quiet Center, which contains an unparalleled group of Art Nouveau buildings dating from the turn of the 20^th century.  Many of these have been restored or are undergoing restoration.  Local real estate offices advertise—in Latvian and English (!)—apartments in them at eye-popping prices.

Our biggest surprise in Latvia came with our visit to Rundāle Palace (Ruhental in the original German), some 90 minutes south of Riga, which we had never heard of.  It was built by one Ernst Johann Biron, a sort-of 18^th century Sammy Glick, who insinuated himself into the company of the future Tsarina Anna Ivanovna, becoming her chief minister and, briefly, regent of Russia after her death.   In the process he was able to amass enough wealth to hire Rastrelli, architect of the Winter Palace, to build a summer residence for him in Courland, the domain granted him as duke by Anna.  The result compares with the imperial palaces outside St. Petersburg, but it is so remote from Riga or any sizeable community we could not understand how Biron planned to attract enough guests to fill its grand halls.

Rundāle Palace

Just one of several reception halls

Duke's private dining room

We drove to Tallinn Friday on an excellent EU-financed highway, stopping at one point to admire the beautiful beach near Pârnu. 

At Gulf of Riga

We realized from preparations underway in Riga that the Midsummer celebration was imminent, but we assumed that it would be held on the day of summer solstice, i.e., June 21.  In the Baltics, however, Midsummer is celebrated on June 24, St. John’s Day, with activities beginning the previous evening.  Moreover, June 23 is an Estonian national holiday celebrating a decisive victory in the 1918 war of independence.  When we reached Tallinn, we found that the Estonians get a head start on the holidays by shutting down museums and other tourist attractions the afternoon of Sunday, June 22.   Thus, between these closures and a constant drizzle on Saturday and Sunday, we did not see as much of Tallinn as we had hoped before our departure Monday evening for Stockholm.

Riga car decorated for Midsummer

What we did see was impressive, however.  The old town has been beautifully restored, and the Toompea Hill, where Parliament and some other government offices are located, offers great views of the Hanseatic architecture.  One of the famous landmarks is the “Kiek-in-de-Köch” tower (Plattdeutsch for “peek into the kitchen”) of the old city wall, so called as its defenders had intimate views of Tallinn homes.   Another highlight was the 13^th-14^th Church of St. Mary the Virgin, the heart of Estonian Lutheranism, where enclosed pews once allowed wealthy parishioners to worship more comfortably on a cold day.   St. Mary’s contrasts with its Russian Orthodox neighbor, the Victorian-Byzantine Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, built by Tsar Alexander III in the 19^th century as an aspect of the empire-wide Russification campaign.

View from Toompea Hill

Rain-swept on Toompea Hill

Solstice evening at main square

Kiek-in-de-Köch tower

Medieval city hall on solstice evening

Interior of Church of St. Mary the Virgin

Alexander Nevsky Cathedral

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Russification resumed after World War II, and Russian speakers from other parts of the USSR came to Latvia and Estonia during the Communist period.  We heard at least as much Russian as Latvian and Estonian on the streets of Riga and Tallinn--not surprising, for in both countries the ethnic Russian percentage of the population (around 30 percent) is concentrated in the major cities.  (The percentage in Lithuania is much lower.)    To safeguard the position of the majority’s native tongue, both countries have restricted full citizenship to post-1940 arrivals and their descendants who have a command of Latvian and Estonian.   The bar has been lowered for language tests, however, and the percentage of non-citizens has dropped considerably.

This is, of course, World Cup season, which is far more important to Europeans than to Americans. The following evidence of  Estonians' World Cup fever appeared in a lingerie store at a Tallinn shopping mall.

We left Tallinn for Stockholm Monday evening on the "Baltic Queen," somewhere between a ferry and a cruise ship with up-scale restaurants, floor show, and night club.  We were warned, however, that the Swedish police would subject drivers to a breathalyzer test upon arrival--and they did!  Before our departure we were treated to a "Blue Angels"-type air show over the port area in honor of Victory Day, but we discovered later that the fancy flying was performed by employees of a private company with no formal association with Estonia or NATO.  Hopefully, we can afford to hire this outfit if Putin decides to most west.

The "Baltic Queen"