Day-by-day programme of this 11-day itinerary across Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
Day 1 — Arrival in Tallinn
Landing in Tallinn, capital of Estonia, with one of the best-preserved medieval centres in Europe. A first stroll among the walls and spires of the old town.
- ✈️ Tallinn — Aeroporto di Tallinn (TLL)
- 📍 Tallinn Old Town — Tallinn's old town is a medieval fairy tale kept intact: cobbled streets, crenellated walls with towers, pastel-coloured merchant houses and the Town Hall Square (Raekoja plats) with its Gothic hall. You climb Toompea, the hill of power, from which the viewpoints offer the most famous view, over the red roofs and church spires to the sea. It is like entering the Hanseatic League. You dine in a medieval tavern. Tomorrow the modern city and the Kadriorg park.
- 🏨 Hestia Hotel Barons — Città Vecchia, Tallinn
Day 2 — Tallinn and Lahemaa
The Baroque Kadriorg palace and Tallinn's creative districts, then the Lahemaa National Park, among bogs, forests, manor houses and villages on the Baltic.
- 📍 Kadriorg — You start at the Kadriorg palace, a Baroque residence built by Tsar Peter the Great, set in a fine park and today an art museum. Nearby, the Telliskivi district, a former industrial area turned creative hub full of street art, cafes, design studios and markets: it is young, digital Estonia (Skype was born here). Tallinn combines its Hanseatic past and modernity. At midday you set off for the nature of Lahemaa.
- 📍 Lahemaa National Park — The Lahemaa National Park, an hour from Tallinn, is a concentrate of Baltic nature: vast bogs crossed by wooden walkways, dense conifer forests, a jagged coast with large erratic boulders and fishing villages like Altja. You also visit elegant restored manor houses, like Palmse. It is a plunge into silent nature and Estonian rural life. You return to Tallinn for the evening. Tomorrow you head south, into Latvia, to Riga.
Day 3 — Towards Riga
A journey south, into Latvia, with a stop in the seaside town of Parnu, to Riga, the largest and liveliest of the Baltic capitals.
- ✈️ Tallinn → Riga — Centro storico di Riga
- 📍 Old Riga (Vecriga) — Vecriga, the UNESCO old town of Riga, is a maze of medieval streets and Hanseatic buildings: the richly decorated House of the Blackheads, the Cathedral, St Peter's church with its panoramic tower and the Three Brothers, the city's oldest houses. All around, cafes, beer halls and music. In the evening, the atmosphere is lively. Tomorrow Riga's real treasure: the Art Nouveau district, the richest in Europe.
- 🏨 Old City Boutique Hotel — Centro / Vecriga, Riga
Day 4 — Art Nouveau Riga
Riga's Art Nouveau district, the richest in Europe, with its decorated facades, and the great Central Market in the former Zeppelin hangars.
- 📍 Art Nouveau District — Riga boasts the largest concentration of Art Nouveau (Jugendstil) architecture in the world: along Alberta street and around it, the facades of the buildings are a triumph of sculpted faces, animals, flowers, masks and fanciful decorations, the work above all of Mikhail Eisenstein (father of the director). You walk with your nose in the air, amazed. A small museum lets you visit an apartment of the period. Then you reach the Central Market, among the largest in Europe, in former airship hangars. Tomorrow the nature of the Gauja valley.
Day 5 — The Gauja valley
An excursion in the Gauja National Park, the 'Latvian Switzerland': the castles of Sigulda and Turaida among the forests, and the medieval town of Cesis.
- 📍 Turaida Castle — The Gauja National Park, nicknamed the 'Latvian Switzerland', is a region of green hills, forests and a river valley carved into red rock. At Sigulda you visit the castles and ride the cable car over the valley; the romantic red Turaida castle rises with its tower and museum, set in a park. You continue to Cesis, one of the most beautiful medieval towns in Latvia, with its ruined castle and cobbled centre. You return to Riga for the evening. Tomorrow you head down into Lithuania.
Day 6 — Rundale, the Hill of Crosses and the coast
The sumptuous Baroque Rundale palace, the moving Hill of Crosses in Lithuania and arrival on the Baltic coast, at the Curonian Spit.
- 📍 Rundale Palace — You leave Riga and reach the Rundale palace, a Baroque and Rococo masterpiece designed by the same architect as the St Petersburg palace, nicknamed the 'Latvian Versailles': lavish halls, stuccoes, frescoes and a magnificent French garden. You continue towards the Lithuanian border, where one of the most evocative places in the Baltics is found: the Hill of Crosses.
- 📍 Hill of Crosses — The Hill of Crosses, near Siauliai, is a unique and moving place: a small hill covered with over a hundred thousand crosses of every size, from large wooden crosses to tiny rosaries, left by pilgrims over the centuries as a symbol of faith and resistance, even when the Soviets tried several times to raze it. The silence broken only by the wind among the crosses is striking. You continue towards the coast, to Klaipeda and the Curonian Spit.
- 🏨 Hotel Nidus — Nida, Penisola dei Curi
Day 7 — The Curonian Spit
The Curonian Spit, a UNESCO site: a thin tongue of sand between sea and lagoon, with giant dunes, forests and fishing villages of colourful houses.
- 📍 Parnidis Dune — The Curonian Spit is a tongue of sand 98 km long and a few metres wide, separating the Baltic Sea from a great lagoon, a UNESCO site. At Nida you climb the Parnidis dune with its sundial, from which you command a sea of golden moving dunes, the 'Sahara of Lithuania', between the blue of the sea and that of the lagoon. The village of Nida is delightful, with the colourful wooden houses of the fishermen and the house where the writer Thomas Mann lived. You cycle among dunes and forests.
Day 8 — Kaunas and towards Vilnius
Crossing Lithuania with a stop in Kaunas, a lively former capital of modernist architecture, to Vilnius, the capital with its great Baroque centre.
- ✈️ Nida → Kaunas — Città Vecchia di Kaunas
- 📍 Vilnius Old Town — Vilnius has one of the largest and most beautiful Baroque historic centres in Eastern Europe, a UNESCO site: a maze of cobbled streets, over forty churches (Gothic, Baroque, Orthodox), hidden courtyards, the neoclassical cathedral with its bell tower and the Gediminas tower dominating from above. The city is compact and very walkable. You stroll among the cafes and breathe a bohemian atmosphere. Tomorrow the city in more depth and the independent republic of Uzupis.
- 🏨 Artis Centrum Hotels — Città Vecchia, Vilnius
Day 9 — Vilnius and Uzupis
A day in Vilnius: the Gediminas tower, the Baroque and Gothic churches, and the quirky 'independent republic' of Uzupis, the bohemian artists' district.
- 📍 Gediminas Tower — You climb the Gediminas tower, the last remnant of the castle on the hill dominating Vilnius: from the top the view embraces the sea of red roofs and spires of the old town. You visit the Baroque masterpieces (the church of Saints Peter and Paul with its extraordinary stuccoes, the church of St Anne in brick Gothic that Napoleon wanted to take to Paris) and the moving Gate of Dawn. In the afternoon, the republic of Uzupis.
- 📍 Uzupis — Uzupis, a district across the Vilnia river, jokingly declared itself an 'independent republic' in 1997: it has its own constitution (posted on a wall in many languages, which states among other things 'everyone has the right to be happy'), a president, a flag and even a symbolic army. It is the bohemian, creative heart of Vilnius, full of galleries, studios, cafes and art installations, with an angel as its symbol. A poetic and amusing place. In the evening, a dinner of Lithuanian flavours. Tomorrow the trip to Trakai castle.
Day 10 — Trakai Castle
A trip to Trakai, the ancient Lithuanian capital, with its spectacular red-brick castle on an island in the middle of the lake: the symbolic image of Lithuania.
- 🎯 Trakai Castle — Half an hour from Vilnius, Trakai was the capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and is today its most famous postcard: a 14th-century red-brick Gothic castle, splendidly restored, rises on an island in the middle of a lake, linked to the shore by a wooden bridge. Inside, a museum tells of Lithuanian history. Around it, the lakes and woods are perfect for a walk or a boat ride; in the village lives the Karaite community, which cooks kibinai (filled pastries). It is a fairy-tale ending. You return to Vilnius for the last evening.
Day 11 — Departure from Vilnius
Return flight from Vilnius. The end of a journey through the three Baltic states, among medieval capitals, palaces, dunes and forests.
- ✈️ Vilnius — Aeroporto di Milano Malpensa (MXP)
