Walking 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 !!!!

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.

We were 5 friends expending 3 days of holidays in Vilnius. We tried to make the most of every day there, and we didn't regret going to this tour!
We had lots of fun and discovered really interesting things about the people, buildings and history of Vilnius.

So our advice will be... Come on! You won't regret it!

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.

Tournwas super with it! The stories were fun and interesting, but not too spooky. A great way to see the city!

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!

You have already seen the most popular places in Vilnius and want to explore the way of living outside the city centre? Then the "Alternative Tour" of Vilnius with Locals is definitely the right thing to do!
The tour starts with a bus drive to the Russian Market, where you can buy almost everything. From smoked and raw meat up to worn out shoes and electronic things. Flowers, fish, clothes and funeral stuff... maybe a little bit bizarr for foreigners, but quite common for locals to buy different things for small money.
After that the guide takes you to Snipiskes. This area gives you an idea how some people live outside the city centre. No tarred roads lead you through this area of small properties with shabby houses. Most of them with no water connections inside the house. Some even burnt-down. Nevertheless you still got some quite modern houses in between.
Another bus drive takes you to the station area. This part of the tour is especially attractive for people, who are interested in arts. Big paintings on house walls from different artists and a big guy in pants ;-) will be on your way. And you will have a short minute at a John Lennon monument.
The tour ends at a market hall. You should go there and have a delicious bagel!

The tour took 2,5 - 3 hours and beside the two bus drives you have to walk quite long, so prepare comfortable shoes ;-)

I really liked the "Alternative Tour"! Thanks a lot to the friendly guides, you made a really good job! And thanks for all the interesting stories during the tour!

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.

It doesn't matter if it's your first time in the city or you've lived here all your life- this tour will surprise, shock or maybe... even entertain you.
Due to the extraordinary talent and the looks of the guide Ieva B., the stories are so well delivered that even if you were always skeptical about ghosts or the old legends- you will start to question your beliefs when you wonder around the dark alleys of this magnificent and mysterious city..
There is no doubt you will get goose bumps and might start to think this guide has a deal with both, the saints and the devil itself, with church bells ringing and street lights blinking on the most terrifying parts of the stories.
However, as she promised in the beginning of the tour- we all returned safe and sound, with the quick and witty answers to the most unexpected questions about the city and recommendations of great places to calm down after the tour.

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.