Klaipeda, Lithuania

Beauty, Beaches, and the Baltic Sea

Walk the cobblestoned Old Town in Klaipėda and you’ll see its German heritage in the half-timbered architecture, beginning at Theatre Square where Hitler once spoke. The old warehouses by the Dane River are now pubs and restaurants - try a traditional Lithuanian lunch of fish stew with warm black bread. There’s a museum in the remnants of Memelburg Castle with fascinating photos from WWII, the Blacksmith Museum with intriguing iron works, and the Clock Museum with, well, clocks.

Klaipėda, close to the Curonian Spit, has some charming seaside resorts to explore. German novelist Thomas Mann had his summerhouse in Nida; it’s now a museum. The Ethnographic Fisherman’s Farmstead is an amazing experience - old fishing vessels and 19th century buildings take you back to the life of a fisherman two centuries ago.

Visit the quaint village of Palanga with miles of beautiful beaches backed by dunes and pine forests.