Back in the (former) USSR

Snow can be nice. If we look past the cold and wet and forget about all the disruption, then I think most people can enjoy a bit of fluffy ice - Even if you don't want to go outside, build snowmen, have snowball fights or slide down a local hill on your favourite bin lid, you can at least look at it and admit that it makes the world look like a postcard... Until it all turns brown or it melts and floods your house - You're allowed to be bored of it then.

I like that really satisfying crunch when you first step into a particularly deep bit of snow, that’s good, unless your foot gets wet.

In Lithuania, during the winter, you have a very good chance of snow, usually between November and February it is a guarantee - 2013 was definitely no exception when our plane tickets took us all the way to Vilnius.

- Infrastructure will be marvelled at in the following paragraph

The first thing you are (ok, I am) likely to
notice is how much everything just keeps on going with all this snow. Back home, I remember a time when it was snowing for a week, no-one could get to work, the roads were unusable and the entire country ground to a halt. Here, it just didn't, nothing stopped, it was just normal, this was just how things were. It probably helps that they have snow for a 3rd of the year, for us its so rare that it just causes the councils to curl up into little council balls and weep their council sized tears... Which does nothing for the subsequent flooding issues.

I wonder if anyone marvels at the way Britain just copes with the near constant rain? Probably not, its not that impressive really... and the fact that we're currently so close to losing Somerset probably doesn't fill the rest of the world with awe.

It was so cold on this holiday, even the trees were wearing jumpers! Temperatures were in the early minuses, but it was pretty manageable as it wasn't windy... Except that one day when there was a street market going on, that one seemed to challenge the stall holders, so I don't think that’s normal weather.

And the crowds gathered to watch the giant man dive into the small pile of snow, secretly hoping that the horse would butt him in first... If I actually looked things up, I wouldn't have to make things up - As good a reason as any to never look anything up.

We could not go to Vilnius without visiting the bust of Frank Zappa, because it is just so odd, he is not from here or has even been here, but they have a statue of him, apparently a group of artists petitioned the government after the fall of communism, presumable just to test how much of a democracy they now had. Apparently enough to get a Frank Zappa bust on a large metal pole.

We were in Lithuania for almost a week, we accidentally stole breakfast, we learnt we liked Lithuanian food and we came home with an ocarina and a set of matryoshka dolls. All in all a successful trip.