Eaten Europe in a week pt 2

[Geoff W]

Next morning I set off early, bright sunshine, which soon changed to fog as I left the coastal plain, Lithuania is fairly flat but gentle rolling hills lifted up into the fog.

About an hour out I came to this junction. This is where i realised, that I was a LONG WAY from home. Kaliningrad is the old Koenigsberg, capital of East Prussia and one of the greatest seats of Mathematical learning in the modern age, it was totally destroyed in the Second War and became part of Russia. In the Cold War it was a closed city , home of the Baltic Fleet, even today there is no way I could get a visa to ride through it, so I had to go around it.
Cold Fog.
I had considered stopping in Kaunas, but the distance I had left myself to cover, made me decide to ride on , heading towards Gdansk on the Polish Baltic coast, I would see how far i could get, taking advantage of the hour time difference between Lithuania and Poland, before I need a rest.
Crossing the border was uneventful, no passport checks, just carry-on past the police watching lorries through binoculars.
Weather improved, and I needed a break, when I saw three crosses on a hill next to the road ( a local road now, not autobahn all single carriageway).


This is a German war cemetery, quite large, the soldiers are buried in 10 meter square blocks. The plaque near the entrance explained that the bodies were moved here from all around this area of Poland in 2001. The large stones record the names and dates of the soldiers in each block, the dates cover from 1939 to 1945, so these are from battles across the whole Second War. There is a small section for 60 or so soldiers from the First War. I thought I was the only visitor, but as I was leaving I met an old man , German with a bunch of flowers in his hand. I said Hallo, he replied and choked back as he spoke, I realised that this was very private grief I was intruding on and left the poor soul to mourn.
By now it was getting hot, I carried on through the Massurian Lakes, a beautiful area which will repay a return visit sometime soon. I then got caught up in severe traffic in a large city Olzcyn? I think or something similar. I regret that my Polish never extended beyond 'Yes", "No" and "Beer", so some of the place names are a bit ragged. Eventually picked up the road I needed , the direction I was heading was for the large city of Elblag near Gdansk, However Polish road signs on smaller roads seem to pick a small village near the end of the road rather than a large city as the sign name.
As I navigate using maps and notes it took a while to realise this, once I got the idea it was not too bad and I had relatively few totally missed turns.
After about ten hours  on the road I came into a small town called Morag, first thing I saw was a nice little 2 star hotel, it was basic , cheap very clean and had a bar and a very good shower, top notch.A good meal and two beers cost about £5.50.


The small Schloss is an old Prussian House, now a museum, The Cannon comes from Liege and was captured during the Franco-Prussian War 0f 1870, unusual as it is cast steel and breach loading, I did  not find a name, but it may be by Krupp. The Soviet era flats have been nicely done up with imagination and a bit of paint, shows what can be done.
The town seemed to go to bed at 22:00 so I did the same, early start, heading up past Gdansk towards Gdynia on a never ending road full of traffic lights and petrol stations. Eventually made it up to the Baltic coast, nice country, big fields and even bigger skies.
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I had set my mind on reaching Swinouscie, which is a border town on the Oder Estuary, turned out to be a mistake. I should have stayed at one of the charming little Baltic villages along the way, would have been much cheaper. However I kept going following the signs for " Centrum" when I surprisingly found myself on a ferry across the Oder.

Swinouscie is a busy port and border town, but only has two hotels, so I got stung for a nights stay here, also beer here costs twice as much as in Morag, but compared to UK that is still cheap.
Apart from the docks the main industry seems to selling cigarettes (very cheap in Poland) to Germans who fill up their car boots to sell around home.
That was the last of the long days rides, I had covered the big miles, now I could afford time to look around more stuff.