European border regions without a passport

Say what you want about European Union, but open borders between countries are such a blessing as a tourist. When Schengen agreement is not suspended for some reason, you can cross borders between EU countries however you like!

Poland-Lithuania Suwałki Gap on a bike

In June 2022 I packed my bike on a train and arrived to Suwałki, a city in north-eastern corner of Poland, about 30km from the border with Lithuania. If you're into geopolitics you may know the place called "Suwałki Gap", as some out-of-touch strategists might put it "one of the most dangerous place in Europe" but for everyone else, it's just a quaint rural area where the Slavic culture of Poland and Baltic culture of Lithuania live side by side in harmony. Cycling is the excellent way to explore the region as roads there are quite empty, hills are not that steep and there is plenty of villages and lakes to stop by and rest a bit. That was my first time ever when I crossed the border by bike and that's such a great way to see in detail how the environment and infrastructure changes between countries. During my trip I visited Suwałki - major city, Wigierski National Park with beautiful Wigry lake, town of Sejny and former border control compound with nearby store that sells beverages and other specifically Lithuanian foods. Right next to a border I met a guy that just at that time, traveled from Edinburgh, Scotland, throughout the coast of Baltic Sea up to his hometown in Lithuania! Super nice to meet him, check out his other bike journeys on @justas_juozaitis Instagram as he's travelling way across the Americas!

On Lithuanian side I visited Lazdijai (Łoździeje in Polish), tiny town with a nice central square and IKI and Maxima supermarket chains (We don't have those in Poland and I like to visit regular stores in other countries, just my thing). After a break and checking-in hostel I took a short 20km spin through the fields and forests to take a look at Dusia Lake (Jezioro Duś), the third largest lake in Lithuania. Just by wondering around the wildernesses I've noticed there are a lot more abandoned buildings than on the Polish side. Lithuania is quite a bit less densely populated, but somehow attracts more storks! The next day I head back to Poland by a different, partially unpaved route to the borderline Galadusys Lake (Jezioro Galaduś), seen on the photo above. The border was so close to that lovely pier that I was able to literally swim back to Poland, but I had to go back the land for my bike.

In Poland I've visited a bunch of bilingual villages with the most prominent one, Punśk (Punskas in Lithuanian) where I took a dinner break in the restaurant that serves cold soups, absolutely refreshing dish in the middle very hot summer day on a bike 💙. The municipal village of Puńsk was the first officially bilingual region in Poland I've ever visited and even though I didn't spend much time there, people really spoke in two languages! All and all I highly recommend travelling by bike through border regions of Europe as it gives great and very detailed perspective on how countries meet each other! I hope I will visit someday the rest of Lithuania, the rest of Baltic states and maybe some other border regions or even European tripoints!

Ačiū Lietuvai LTPL for a great time!

Denmark-Sweden Øresund Strait by train

Denmark and Sweden are connected by a super impressive bridge and tunnel (visible from pier in Malmö, next to Turning Torso Tower, on my photo above) across vast strait of Øresund. I had a pleasure to see this the passage from a plane and then by taking a train between Copenhagen and Malmö main stations.

Gdańsk, my gateway to Scandinavia

My journey started in Polish coastal city of Gdańsk from which I had a very cheap flight to Copenhagen. By the way, Gdańsk is also great city to visit, even that one day was well spent. I arrived by train at about 12AM, rent an e-scooter to ride around nice network of bike lanes, in the afternoon I was on the waterfront park, beach and pier at nearby resort town Sopot, later wondering around the old city district all night and my flight was so early in the morning that I don't even book any hostel. Gdańsk is super pretty, super livable and quite vibrant at all times of the day. If you know a bit of history, you don't even need to visit any museums to see the traces of history everywhere, even the recent one. I was sightseeing the Old Town and stumbled upon a sign located on a spot where the Mayor of Gdańsk was fatally stabbed during charity event in 2019, it was on the news everywhere, now I was just standing there. But you can also forget it all and just have fun at local pubs that I feel like are more chill than those in Warsaw or Kraków, I jumped for a quick pint to the pub with a theme of Polish famous movies, the coolest decorations I've seen in Poland. Then I just roam around the city at night and never felt threatened and I'm not a creep or big guy, and I don't think any foreigner would be in danger in my position.

That article is suppose to be about European border regions and Gdańsk kinda is. Historically Gdańsk or Danzig in German was a meeting point of Teutonic Order, Dutch and Scottish settlers, Prussia and until the end of World War II, Germany. Nowadays it's close enough to Konigsberg (russia's Kaliningrad) that before this stupid putin's inflicted war on Ukraine, Russians were able to visit Poland visa-free and they often took one day trips up to Gdańsk. Russia is like 2 hours away (it used to be) so it counts too.

Copenhagen is just pure nice

Airplane tickets from Gdańsk to Copenhagen and back for one person cost me 15€, and it made me feel a bit of flygskam, but it was so worth it, the trip of my life. Copenhagen seemed like a super high quality city right from the gate, exactly as I imagined. I was delighted by that driverless metro train and by a 15 minutes I landed in a central part of the city with large modern building, high tenements, clean lawns and wide canal in the middle. It was on Sunday early in the morning and the city felt so pleasantly noiseless and unhurried.

The best way to travel around the city is by bike, which was the prime thing that I wanted to do in Copenhagen. The absolute highlight of my visit was a bike trip with a super cool guide and the group of tourists, mainly from USA, but also from France, UK, Germany and South Africa. I was the only guy from Poland so I was asigned as the watcher, I rode at the end of the group so no one is missing, an honour!

To be continued and expanded...

Malmö is way less touristy

Right-wing media all around the western world used to call the city a no-go zone run by muslim immigrants. As usual, media are overblowing the issues, and just like in the Polish-Lithuanian border area, on the ground, the situation is nothing scary.

That being said, the very first thing that I saw in Sweden when the train stopped at the first station, was some scramble between the two security personel and some guy that does not look 'typically Swedish'. If I were some far right pundit I would be delighted to tweet it as a confirmation of my racist beliefs (and totally not mention a whole lot of people from various ethnic backgrounds that were completely normal, including some two ladies getting along in the bus, and one of those was wearing hijab) I'm not a racist, so I just shrugged and wait till I arrive to the main station to explore on my own.

It takes about 30 minutes to travel between København H and Malmö C - central stations of Copenhagen and Malmö. Trains are comfortable, run quite frequently and the tickets are not that expensive. Oresund bridge is really impressive if you love infrastructure, if not, the ride is just average.

Turning Torso is the second highest tower in Scandinavia, superseded just recently by some new tower in Gotheborg. I wanted to see that Swedish landmark ruller skyscraper since it was used as an example in one of the video of the monumental and super serious series about debunking the flat earth, made by Polish youtuber Sci-Fun (English human-made subtitles are available). In person that tower and especially its surroundings look like an eerily empty game level of a a city where everything is grey and modern. I'm not saying that's ugly, the area was clean and super elegant, the slighty rainy weather and very few people around made it look and feel cold. The photo above shows the pier that is in the walking distance from the tower to the shore and it's the ideal place if you want to stop walking, staring at Denmark at the distance and just think.

To be continued and expanded...