Lithuania's Baltic escape

The mix of architecture, cultures and languages in Vilnius The Soviet soldiers were the last thing I expected to see as I walked across the river into the centre of Vilnius for the first time. One cradling a sub-machine gun, the other clutching a pair of binoculars

, they stood at the side of the city's Green Bridge, eyeing passers-by with suspicion. Lithuania has been an independent country for more than 20 years now, but even atop a pedestal and cast in iron, the ghosts of this city's past are impossible to ignore.

For many people, the Baltic countries (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia) are still an unlikely holiday destination, despite the fact that they are moving forward at an astonishing pace.
Indeed, the only reason tourists are able to come face-to-face with the soldiers is that the Green Bridge is one of the few Soviet-era monuments deemed important enough to be preserved as Lithuania's capital transforms itself after decades of communist rule. Take one look at a typical Vilnius Old Town street, though, and it's clear that this isn't the first transformation the city has undergone.
"Change?" asks my guide Jolita with a wry smile, as we begin our tour of the city. "Vilnius is always changing!"
She points at the flagstaff at the top of the city's Gediminas Castle and Museum, an intricately restored medieval vantage point that is now easily accessible to tourists via a funicular railway. Today, the Lithuanian flag flutters proudly in the wind, but that wasn't always the case.
"This place has a symbolism for Lithuanians," she explains. "It wasn't always our flag - it could have been Soviet or German or Polish. Now, the colours are ours again; the yellow of the sun, the green of the hills and red - the colour of martyrs."
Lithuania's first restoration to independence after 120 years under the Russian Empire came in 1918 during the closing days of the First World War, I learn. Although much of the country prospered during the inter-war years, Vilnius was occupied by Poland until 1940, when the country became the scene of a brutal tug of war between Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. In 1944, the Red Army won out and Lithuanians lived behind the Iron Curtain until 1990, when the nation once again declared its independence from Moscow.
As we wander the uneven footpaths and narrow lanes that make up the city's historical centre, Jolita tells the story through Vilnius' Baroque, Gothic, Neoclassical and Renaissance architecture, showing how each period left traces that have turned Vilnius into a curious mix of cultures, languages and buildings. Our stroll takes us past the pastel buildings of Vilnius' medieval university, elaborate Catholic and Russian Orthodox churches from the 19th century and grey Soviet monstrosities constructed during Soviet rule. That city planners could erect such buildings without regard to the architectural beauty of their historical neighbours is anathema to me, but Jolita just shrugs. "That's just the way it was," she says.
It's a sense of acceptance that characterises the response of most Lithuanians when asked about their country's years of communism - always a subject of fascination among the steadily growing number of western visitors.
Popular tours around Vilnius' darkest building, the former KGB headquarters and now a "genocide museum" (Auku Gatve 2a), regularly end in tears, Jolita says. In the dank basements, where the cells, solitary confinement rooms and an execution chamber have been preserved since their use in the shockingly recent past, it's easy to see why. The story of Lithuania's bitter struggle for freedom told on the upper exhibition floors is fascinating, but it took days to get the disturbing image of a grim padded cell, complete with a strait-jacket hanging ghost-like from the ceiling, out of my head.
Tourism officials are keen to underline that, as Lithuania progresses as an independent country, the capital offers more to tourists than ever. This helps to explain its soaring popularity - in the first half of this year, arrivals rocketed by 30 per cent to more than 300,000 tourists. An increasing number of European carriers, many of them low-cost, now serve the city's tiny airport, which lies only 6km from the city centre.