Cultural & History Tours in Vilnius

I joined the two hour walking tour dedicated to the history of the Jews in Vilnius. The tour became one of the high points on my 6th visit to Vilnius. I had never taken a guided walking tour before, and this tour gave me much more than I had expected, thanks to the very knowledgeable and enthusiastic guide, Milda Jukniute.
I had been reading in advance about the time in history when Vilnius was known as the Jerusalem of East Europe. Milda gave us a very good introduction to this period, and how the Jewish community in town lived through the centuries up until the begining of the Second World War. On our wals she took us into small, hidden courtyards to show us how family life had been and the dwellings of famous religious persons and artists.

Then the tour took on a much more dark atmosphere, as we walked through the areas of the town where the small and the large gettho had been located during the war. Not much remains of the buildings now, but wherever it was something to see, she pointed it out for us. It would have been impossible to find these remains without a local guide. The tour ended with a very interesting visit to the only fuctioning synagogue in Vilnius.

I can really reccommend this walking tour, as it gave a very good insight in both the glorious and the dark side of the Jewish history in Vilnius. Our guide Milda was absolutely excellent, and for a Norwegian it came as an extra bonus that she spoke Norwegian fluently! (The guiding was done in English for the benefit of the other participants, and her English was also outstanding)

My friend and myself went on the bespoke Jewish Tour , our guide was Milda. This began at the villnius town hall with a very clear orientation from Milda, then a walk around the old city that contained so much history. Deeply moving as I have family and my friend is from family who lived in Villnius. Milda was able to give us clear insight as well as deep sensitivity in the way she conducted the tour.
Thankyou !!!!

The tour guide Elsa took me and my girlfriend on a nice walk through Vilnius and told us many stories about Lithuania under soviet rule. We did the tour pretty much off season so it was just the three of us on the tour. We got the chance to ask all sorts of questions and got great answers and good tips on how to spend the rest of our time in Vilnius. Thank you Elsa!

We spent a weekend in Vilnius and this guided tour with our guide Milda was a superb way to find out what interesting and exciting is there to be found in this wonderful city. Thank you Milda and lkkealocalguide for this opportunity, it really made our weekend in Vilnius a perfect and relaxing little holiday.
Lasse, Tiina, Kimmo and Anne from Finland.

This is quite a long tour, but well worth it. (Don't worry, there's a break for coffee). The guide is very interesting to listen to, it's not just the regular repeating of facts. We learned a lot from this tour. Fantastic stories!

Enjoyed the tour seeing aspects of Vilnius we would never had seen had we been walking around ourselves with a map.

Our guide had a wonderful personality and threw in just enough history without making it boring.

milda, our tour guide, was excellent -- well-prepared, well-informed, and sharing in what she knew

she was also very relaxed and generous in allowing us to take part in the conversation

highly recommended

We had the pleasure of a guided tour provided by one of your guides, Martyna, this sunday. It was a very inspiring tour and your tourguide Martyne made it very interesting. We took the Soviet tour.

Our guided was amazingly wonderful. Spoke English really well and had plenty of time and room for questions. Funny, knowledgeable, and just excellent. Made our short 4 day stay incredible.

Excellent tour around vilnius, with a very knowledgeable guide. Very informative and answered everyone's questions.

Very interesting tour, and the guide was very knowladgeble, an increadible amount of info during the 3 hours.

Well planned out and paced tour. A good introduction to contemporary local history.

Great guide and great tour in Vilnius, definitely worth it!

I did this food tour my 2nd day in Vilnius, and was extremely pleased with the tour. I've done a lot of food tours, and while they are never bad, some are certainly better than others, and this was one I will remember.

We had a lot of delicious and interesting food. Much of the food would not be things I would have ordered on my own, and I wasn't expecting to enjoy it as much as I did.

The tour started with little tastes of interesting local and historical things with stories of why these foods came to be popular or associated with Lithuania.

We had cold beet soup with potatoes (which I thought would be OK, but was actually amazing)

We had the zeppelin shaped potato dumpling filled with meat and topped with sour cream and learned how it came to be the national dish

Tried some local beer and fried bread

Finally, some Dione (local brand) of ice cream that had shredded cheese (which is also a local delicacy).

Honestly, none of this food sounds very good, but it was so delicious and interesting! Super glad I came on this tour, and I highly recommend it! Great introduction to Lithuania and Vilnius.

We thoroughly enjoyed our food tour with Ieva, who collected us promptly from our hotel reception as arranged. Ieva is enthusiastic about Vilnius, and delightful company. She took us to places we would never have found, and introduced us to food we would never have tried otherwise. The small organic grocery shop where we started with traditional ‘nibbles’ was unidentifiable from the outside. We also tried a boletus soup in dark rye bread bowl which was delicious, zeppelins and then walked to the newer part of the city to Dzugas to try cheese in a variety of ways -as hard cheese, in icecream, cheesecake, and cheese bars covered in chocolate.
Walking between the various places gave us time to digest the food, and sitting with Ieva at each place was a delight as she shared stories of her family traditions.

We had only two days in Vilnius! At first we wanted to take a free walking tour, but then we realized that we arrive too late to be a part of it and next day we leave too early, so we’ve contacted Vilnius With Locals for the city tour! We did not want to see only the Old Town, so we’ve asked the guide to change the Old Town route so we could see more sides of the city, not only all those beautiful churches. The guide took us to some beautiful courtyards, the republic behind the river and some other interesting places that we would not have found by ourselves in such a short period of time in Vilnius . During 2,5 hours we’ve learned a lot about the life in the city today and in the past. What a great choice it was to contact Vilnius With Locals! Fully recommended for everyone visiting Vilnius!

My wife and I joined two traveling companions for the Jewish Vilnius Tour, conducted by Milda. The tour took about 2-1/2 hours, winding through the streets of the former Jewish community as well as the areas where the WWII ghettoes were established, stopping at several monuments and building remnants. The pace was perfect for relatively active seniors. Our guide, Milda, was very well-informed on both past and current events regarding Jews in Vilnius, offering detailed history, useful context, and personal insights from her own experience and research. She eas personable, patient with our questions, curious about her guests, and spoke clearly, with a very good command of English. Thank you!

For anyone in Vilnius, be you a regular visitor, a weekend guest or even a local, I highly recommend the Soviet walking tour. Ieva was the guide during my trip and she brought such charisma and charm to what is a dark chapter in the memory of many Lithuanians. Her passion for history, especially the human aspect of it lead me to learn many things that you can't read about in travel guides or online articles. She was happy to answer any question and suggested movies and further reading to build on what we discussed. Whether you have just arrived in Vilnius or are at the end of your stay, don't hesitate to go, you'll soon see the city in a different light.