Come to Vilnius for few days? You should visit Trakai - small town near the Lithuanian capital. Can you imagine city is situated between the 72 lakes!!! Lake Galve is the biggest. With my son Vladyslav we decided to take a big wooden boat for discovering the lake.
If you real Trakai citizen you should have a boat. I think for those people boats are like cars. Many houses are located on the other side of the lake and people use boats for swimming between banks.
Tourists can swim also - by boat and by small catamaran (it works like bicycle - you should pedall). With my son we wanted to take a big boat with paddles. And it’s wonderful that we didn’t do it - it’s very hard work ? Finally we took a catamaran. It was a good idea.
We swam for 2 hours. I really enjoyed it. Who will be in Trakai, just know: you should take small catamaran for 8 euro per hour. But we paid only 4 euro. We just rented catamaran a little further from the castle.
Trakai was an important military and political centre and headquarters of the Lithuanian Grand Dukes. But not only - many centuries ago Trakai was the capital of Lithuania. And Trakai castle had a very important role in old Lithuania. Now it’s an awesome place for learning history and relax.
The castle was constructed in the second half of the 14th century. But it was destroyed in the 17th century. It was nothing there. Modern Trakai castle has been completely restored in 1987.
Trakai is also known for Karaims. They are the smallest nation of Turkic descent that presently live in Lithuania since the 14th century. These people speak Karaim language. It’s mix of Karachay-Balkar, Kumyk and Crimean Tatar language.
For lunch we chose Karaim restaurant and tried typical food. The most popular Karaim’s dish is kybyn. It’s a small pasty with meat or cheese. I ordered a cold beet soup also. It was tasty. My son is conservative - he chose pasta with seafood.
How to get to Trakai from Vilnius? By car, by bus (from Vilnius Bus Station) or by train (from the Railway Station). It’s very easy. Only 45-50 minutes and here you are.
Hello, @NatalkaR
Thank you for sharing this great report and beautiful photos!
I understood well that Trakai is absolutely perfect for family travel We need to add it to my favorite list.
Hey @NatalkaR , this is a great post! I will put Trakai in my bucket list for sure, because I like a lot small town like this. Looks like a place from fairy tail, maybe because of the castle And as I can see from your photos you had a nice time there. Thanks for the tips and special thanks for sharing the old cafe AJ Šokoladas, me like your son, would like to try all of these sweets!
You have the great ability to change my day in a positive direction every time you write a post.
What a beauty !!! You and Vladyslav are really a couple that love to have fun, giving us the possibility, day by day, to learn something new about the places you visit.
Can we reach Trakai easily with the public transport, or is better to have a car for travelling around the area?
Hermosas fotos @NatalkaR el lugar se impresionante para visitar, el castillo esta en buen estado, cuantas películas medievales se habrán filmado entre esas paredes ? . Lo que me llamo la atención es la comida, y en especial la foto de lo que nosotros aqui llamamos empanada con un repulgue muy típico de como lo hacemos en Argentina.
Por supuesto los dulces me pueden y en especial estar torta de chocolate se ve sabrosa.
Otra cosa que me llamo la atención de tu post, es el comentario sobre el idioma el “Karaim”, tanto que me puse a leer un poco mas al respecto y comprender lo extendido que estan las familias del lenguaje Turco con todas sus variantes llegando a un total de 150 millones de hablantes entre todas las variantes y distribución de habitantes.
Me pareció tan rico tu post en información, imágenes hermosas y poder ver por algunas ventanas de esos paises sobre los que en muchas ocaciones no se conoce casi nada, por lo menos en el sur de America.
Saludos Farid
For the case that has difficulty, in reading my answer, in the upper left part of the screen, in the drop-down menu of languages, you can select the language, in which you want to read the post.
I also enjoyed reading your post and love the photos @NatalkaR Trakai castle looks amazing and so does the chocolate sweets and cakes. Did your son really try all that?
@Ivi_Ge thanks a lot! I’m sure you’ll like Trakai. It’s special atmosphere there. I was there in February, it was very cold but very and very nice i adore small town
@ErmesT thank you for your kind words!!! I really enjoyed when travel with my son. He’s interested interested in everything and it’s cool of course, it’s better to come in Trakai by car. It’sfaster and more convenient. But you don’t need a car in the city you can walk everywhere. I went to Trakai by bus. It was very small bus, without air-conditioning - it was very difficult. But I came back by train and it was awesome - big train, many empty seats, with air-conditioning. And we paid just 1,8 euro
@FaridTDF thanks a lot!!! I’m really happy that you like it!!! About movies: in Soviet Union many films were filmed in Trakai. Because Lithuania was part of Soviet Union and it was easy to do it
For sure I will like it, @NatalkaR and if I have a chance I will visit this magical place Here in Bulgaria, we also have small towns like this, so you are welcome to visit some of them.
@Ivi_Ge thanks for invitation!!! I’m sure Bulgaria is very beautiful country and I’ll come there. And kne day you should visit Ukraine (we also have many amazing small town)
nice place…apart from enjoying beautiful pics and ur whole story i enjoyed how u and ur son enjoyed like the best friend and had great memories, which ironically isn’t made ur day but others like us too by sharing it through this post…keep up the good work …and keep sharing such amazing stories…
What a great experience you had! My favourite photos were the ones with all the desserts, I am sure it’s no surprise! What was your favourite one (even though you don’t like sweets that much)?
By the way, as far as I know, the coldbeet soup is called chlodnik or at least that’s what they called it in Warsaw when I tried it last year there. I really liked it not only the taste but also its colour - I love pink!
One day for sure I should visit Ukraine, @NatalkaR and I am sure that there are lot of beautiful places. One of mine friend told me about one very romantic place called Tunnel Of Love, have you ever been there?
We need to add it to my favorite list.
i adore small town 
