48 Hours in Klaipėda, Lithuania: Things to Do from Port to Dunes

Start at Theatre Square, the natural centre of the old town. The Klaipėda Drama Theatre faces it, its present building dating from 1857 after an earlier one burned down. In front stands a small bronze girl on a fountain: Ännchen von Tharau, the heroine of a seventeenth-century love song by Simon Dach, who was born in Memel in 1605. The first statue was put up in 1912 and disappeared around the time of the Second World War. The figure seen today is a replica, installed in 1989 with help from German families who had once lived in the region.

The balcony of the theatre has a darker place in the city’s memory. In March 1939 Lithuania was forced to hand the Klaipėda Region back to Germany under an ultimatum, and on 23 March Adolf Hitler arrived by sea and spoke to the crowd, an address usually placed on this balcony. Before that, the city had changed hands several times in a single generation. The Treaty of Versailles separated the region from Germany after the First World War, French troops administered it, and in January 1923 a revolt brought it under Lithuanian rule.

From the square, the lanes of the old town lead south and east. Many buildings here are half-timbered, a Prussian style rarely seen elsewhere in Lithuania, with dark beams set into pale plaster. Warehouses that once stored grain and timber now hold galleries, small hotels and bars. The streets are compact, and an hour of aimless walking covers most of them.

That German character is not a decoration. For centuries Memel was the northernmost town of Prussia, and the region around it, known in Lithuanian as Lithuania Minor, was home to both German and Lithuanian speakers. Some of the first books printed in Lithuanian were produced by Protestant scholars in this Prussian borderland, and the region kept a separate identity from the rest of Lithuania well into the twentieth century. After 1945 most of the German-speaking population was gone, and the city was rebuilt and resettled under Soviet rule.

Klaipėda Castle lies a few minutes to the west, between the old town and the port. The Teutonic Knights completed a fort here in 1252 and called it Memelburg, which is how the city got its German name. The castle was rebuilt in 1409 and gradually dismantled in later centuries, and what remains are earthworks, bastions and foundations. Inside the restored bastions, the castle museum tells the story of the fortress and of Lithuania Minor, the region along the lower Nemunas that was ruled from Prussia for centuries. Excavated finds fill the rooms beneath the ramparts.

On the way back, look down at the water by the castle harbour. A bronze figure in a hooded cloak, known as the Black Ghost, appears to climb out of the channel. It recalls a legend from 1595, in which a guard on the castle walls saw a dark figure rise from the water with a warning of hard times for the city. Nearby, a swing bridge over the old castle moat is still turned by hand to let boats through.

In the afternoon, walk north along the Danė, the small river that cuts the city in two. Moored on its bank is the Meridianas, a three-masted sailing ship that once trained students of the city’s maritime school and now ranks among the most recognisable symbols of Klaipėda. Further on, the Martynas Mažvydas Sculpture Park occupies the site of the old town cemetery. Between 1977 and 1991, Lithuanian artists placed more than a hundred modern sculptures among the old trees, and a few surviving iron crosses from the graves stand near the edges.

Evenings belong to the riverfront and the old town lanes. Beer here usually means Švyturys, a brewery founded in the city in 1784, served cold at outdoor tables along the Danė in summer. A day of walking ends well with a glass and the long Baltic twilight, which in June keeps the sky light until well after ten.

The day starts at the Old Ferry Terminal near the castle, where a passenger ferry crosses the channel to Smiltynė in about five minutes. It carries foot passengers and cyclists only; cars use the New Ferry Terminal further south. On the far side, the city’s noise disappears almost at once, replaced by pine trees and the smell of resin.

The Curonian Spit is a narrow strip of sand dunes and forest 98 kilometres long, separating the Curonian Lagoon from the open Baltic. The northern 52 kilometres belong to Lithuania; the southern part lies in Russia’s Kaliningrad region. In places the spit is only a few hundred metres wide, and from the road both waters can be glimpsed through the trees. UNESCO inscribed it on the World Heritage List in 2000 as a cultural landscape shaped by people and wind together.

That shaping was not always gentle. Centuries of grazing and logging stripped the forest, and the dunes began to march across the spit, burying whole villages. From 1825 the Prussian authorities began a long programme of replanting, fixing the sand with grasses, brushwood fences and pine. The forest that lines the road today is largely the result of that work.

Cyclists have another option. A dedicated cycle path, about 52 kilometres long, runs the length of the Lithuanian spit from Smiltynė to Nida, mostly through forest and occasionally along the lagoon. Bikes can be hired in Klaipėda and taken on the passenger ferry, and the path is flat apart from a few short climbs over old dunes. Riding all the way down and catching a bus back is a full and tiring day, so many riders cover one section, such as Juodkrantė to Pervalka, and spend the saved hours in Nida. Sections of the path have been rebuilt in recent years, and it is worth checking for detours before setting out.

Buses meet the ferry at Smiltynė and run south along the only road. The first stop of note is Juodkrantė, about 19 kilometres down the spit, a quiet resort of wooden villas facing the lagoon. Above the village rises the Hill of Witches, a forest trail lined with about 80 wooden sculptures carved by folk artists, the first of them in 1979. Witches, devils, kings and fishermen from Lithuanian legends lurk among the pines, some benign, some grotesque, and children run between them. North of the village, a large colony of grey herons and great cormorants nests in the treetops, and the trees beneath have been bleached white by their droppings.

Beyond Juodkrantė the road passes through forest for many kilometres. At about the 32nd kilometre from Smiltynė lie the Nagliai Nature Reserve and the Dead Dunes, bare grey hills of sand that once buried several villages. Short paths lead to viewpoints, but the dunes themselves are protected and walking on them off the marked trails is not allowed. The villages of Pervalka and Preila sit quietly on the lagoon shore further south.

Nida, about 49 kilometres from the ferry, is the largest settlement on the Lithuanian part of the spit and the place to spend most of the day. Its wooden houses are painted in deep blues and browns, with gardens full of flowers and fish smokehouses along the lagoon. The village has moved before. The original settlement stood about five kilometres further south; a plague in 1709 killed nearly all of its inhabitants, and drifting sand later pushed the village north to its present site. Today Nida has around 1,500 permanent residents, a number that multiplies in July and August. Since 2001 it has hosted the Nida Jazz Festival, with concerts on the lagoon shore in summer.

Look at the rooftops and the old poles by the harbour for the carved and painted weathervanes, a tradition from the time when every fishing boat flew a pennant showing its home village.

On a hill above the lagoon stands the summer house of Thomas Mann. The novelist visited Nida in 1929, had the house built, and spent the summers of 1930 to 1932 there with his family, working on Joseph and His Brothers. Locals mocked its steep thatched roof by calling it Uncle Tom’s Cabin. The house now holds a memorial exhibition and hosts a festival in his name each summer.

From the south edge of Nida, a path climbs to the Parnidis Dune, the high point of the day at about 52 metres above sea level. Steps and boardwalks protect the sand, and at the top stands a sundial whose stone gnomon is 13.8 metres tall. Built in 1995, it was broken by a storm and rebuilt in 2011. The view is the reward: the lagoon on one side, the Baltic on the other, the red roofs of Nida below, and to the south a sea of bare dunes running into Russian territory. The border itself is a few kilometres away, out of sight.

The return bus runs back up the spit to Smiltynė. Before heading home, the long beach on the Baltic side at Smiltynė is a good place to watch the sun go down over the sea. The passenger ferry runs into the late evening, but the last sailing changes with the season, so it pays to check the time before settling on the sand.

A third morning, or a slower second day, opens up several more things to do in Klaipėda and nearby.

The Lithuanian Sea Museum sits at Kopgalis, the northern tip of the spit, a short walk from the Smiltynė ferry. It occupies a nineteenth-century fort built to guard the harbour entrance, partly destroyed in the Second World War and restored in the 1970s. The museum opened in 1979 with an aquarium and maritime exhibitions in the old casemates, and a dolphinarium followed in 1994. Seals and sea lions swim in outdoor pools, and the ramparts look straight across the channel at the lighthouse and the passing ships. Summer afternoons are the busiest time, and morning visits avoid most of the queues.

Palanga, about 25 kilometres up the coast, is Lithuania’s main summer resort and a different world from Klaipėda: long sandy beaches, a pedestrian main street lined with cafés, and a 470-metre pier that draws a crowd at sunset. In Birutė Park, the Tiškevičiai Palace, built for Count Feliks Tiškevičius in the 1890s, houses the Palanga Amber Museum, opened in 1963. Its collection numbers thousands of pieces, many with insects and plant fragments trapped inside. Buses link Klaipėda and Palanga throughout the day.

The city’s own beaches lie to the north. Melnragė, a short bus ride from the centre, has a wide sandy beach and a pier, and Giruliai, further up, is backed by pine forest. Smiltynė’s beach across the channel is the quickest escape on foot. All three are popular on warm weekends, and the sand is soft and pale along the whole coast.

Klaipėda is better connected than its size suggests, because it is a port first and a city second.

• By ferry: DFDS sails overnight from Kiel in Germany, a crossing of roughly 20 hours, and from Karlshamn in Sweden, around 14 hours. TT-Line runs from Trelleborg in Sweden.
• By air: Palanga International Airport lies about 30 kilometres north of the city, with flights to several European cities. City bus 100 runs between the airport and Klaipėda.
• By train: Direct LTG Link trains from Vilnius take roughly four to four and a half hours, crossing the country from east to west. Several trains run daily.
• By bus: Long-distance coaches link Klaipėda with Vilnius, Kaunas and Riga, arriving at the bus station next to the railway station.

Most things to do in Klaipėda itself, from the old town to the castle and the river, are within walking distance, and local buses cover the beaches. For the spit, the ferry and the bus are enough; a bicycle hired in Klaipėda or Nida makes the trip even more flexible.

The season is short and bright. June to August is warm, with average highs around 22 °C in July and August and lows in the low teens. The days are long, so a sunset beach walk after a full day on the spit is possible. Klaipėda, Lithuania’s largest coastal city, is at its liveliest during the Sea Festival, held over a long weekend at the end of July or early August, which has been staged since 1934 and fills the waterfront with concerts and tall ships. Accommodation in Nida and Klaipėda fills early for that weekend.

September is calmer and still mild, and the forests on the spit begin to smell of mushrooms. The sea is cool all year, so swimming is a summer pleasure, and even then the Baltic is brisk.

Weather on the coast changes quickly in any month. A sunny morning in Klaipėda can turn into a grey, windy afternoon on the dunes, where there is no shade and no shelter from the breeze off the sea. A light windproof layer, sunscreen and water are worth carrying on the spit even in July, and the top of the Parnidis Dune is noticeably cooler than the streets of Nida below.

Winter is long, dark and cold, with ice on the lagoon in hard years. The city still has its theatres and museums, but many guesthouses and cafés on the spit close and buses run less often. For a 48 hours plan centred on the dunes, the months from June to September work best.

Most visitors base themselves in Klaipėda’s old town or near the Danė, within walking distance of the ferry and the castle. Guesthouses and small hotels in converted warehouses suit a short stay. Staying overnight in Nida is the alternative for anyone who wants the spit at dawn and dusk, when the day visitors have left; rooms there are limited and book up months ahead for July and August. Juodkrantė, halfway down, is a quieter compromise, with guesthouses facing the lagoon and an easy bus connection in both directions.

Prices in Klaipėda are moderate by northern European standards, and outside the Sea Festival weekend a room can often be found at short notice. On the spit, the opposite applies, and high-summer rooms in Nida rarely appear at the last minute.

Lithuanian cooking is hearty. Cepelinai, the large potato dumplings named after zeppelins for their shape, come filled with meat or curd and topped with sour cream and bacon. In summer nearly every menu offers šaltibarščiai, a cold soup of beetroot and kefir, served with hot boiled potatoes on the side. Dark rye bread comes with almost everything. On the Curonian Spit, the speciality is smoked fish, sold from smokehouses in Juodkrantė and Nida, where bream, eel and flounder hang above alder wood fires.

The city’s best eating streets follow the Danė and the old town lanes around Theatre Square, and the cellar restaurants there often serve both Lithuanian and German dishes, a reminder of the city’s double history.

Travellers linking Klaipėda with other cities in central and eastern Europe will find more ideas in the magazine. Braşov, in the hills of Transylvania, is another old merchant town shaped by German settlers. For a contrast in scenery, Russia’s kremlins and churches in photographs show the country that owns the other half of the spit. Small harbour towns with a national park on the doorstep have a cousin in Bar Harbor beside Acadia in Maine, and anyone looking for warmer seas can follow a week of ferries along the Dalmatian coast. Nida hosts its own jazz festival each summer, smaller cousin to the Montreux Jazz Festival on Lake Geneva. Further reading sits in the travel guides section.

One last practical note. The passenger ferry is the quickest way back across the channel, and its timetable is posted on the boards at both terminals, which list the last crossing of the night.