In my best Steve Baulmer voice (now let me stop you right there - if you are not a computer nerd and if you don't know what a Steve Baulmer is .... Please go to YouTube right now and look up Steve Baulmer going crazy - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wvsboPUjrGc&sns=em then this minor pop reference might make sense.) Ahem.... "I .....Love.... This ..... City!!!!!" Krakow - you are a jewel in the heart of Europe! We went up to Krakow castle this morning. ...

Woke up to our last morning in Lithuania, if you can call 3:15am "morning". Taxi came and drove us to the airport. I realized the problem I was having with driving in Vilnius was all about timing. If I drove at 4am I think I would have no problem - as our taxi belted across cobble stones and narrow winding streets without another car in sight. Rita and Olga turned up at 5am and Olga had presents for me at the airport. They have both been so kind to us. We then ...

I feel the tension just below my left shoulder blade first. Even before I get in the car, even before I leave the apartment and walk downstairs. Like someone has a hard, gnarled rope and has somehow tied it around me so the pressure is centred on that bit just below the shoulder blade. That is how I feel before I get into the car to drive through Vilnius. It takes every bit of concentration to get through the streets and avoid other drivers who have little concep...

Monday 17th September We all had a decent sleep in this morning- then woke up being Vanessa's birthday on both sides of the world. As Bruce Cockburn once sang - Panger of Love. So wishing I could be there with her- or better still , she and Is and Lu and Sam could be here with me. So feeling like this it was a quiet Vilnius day. Some wandering around - a bit more souvenir shopping... Then I went to organize the big event for the evening. We had to catch a bus...

We awoke early and walked through a little fir forest to get to the lagoon. Then breakfast in the forest courtesy of Rita. We packed up and headed down to Nida. The southern most Lithuanian part of the Coronian Spit. Beyond that is Russian territory - a section of land that is geographically separate to the rest of Russia. Kalingrad is in that section. We walked up massive sand dunes that gave us a view if the lagoon on one side, the Baltic Sea on the other, and...