Railway Dog

We arrived in Klaipeda close to midnight, thanks to the only train options there from Siauliai (or Vilnius or anywhere) being very early or very late. On the plus side, I didn’t get hassled for not having a reservation, there were no dog issues, and my Interrail pass went down okay.

After a bit of breakfast in Klaipeda, we headed for the passenger ferry over to the Curonian Spit and Naringa National Park. This ferry runs about every 2 hours at this time of year (late May), and Google Maps had the times right. There’s also a car ferry a bit further south which goes more frequently, but it isn’t met by the bus on the other side and is a much longer walk from the train station. So the northern ferry from Klaipeda to Nida is the one for foot passengers like me. It was easy to buy a ferry ticket from a machine for a couple of euros, and another couple for my bag, but nothing for a dog.

The bus was sitting in the car park on the Naringa side, waiting with a surly driver. Luggage goes under the bus. Dogs must be held. Dog owners have to be in the front seats, which is a plus. 6€ for me, 1€ for Baspie dog, paid to the driver. Holding a dog and a bag and getting out cash isn’t easy. It seemed he got an angry joy out of making it hard.

There was no printed price list or info about where the bus goes or what the prices and rules are, but he hates answering questions and doesn’t speak English, so he didn’t appreciate all the non local passengers 😅 I have since found Curonian Spit and Nida travel info on the Naringa website.

The bus turned out to stop in the centre of Nida, near the supermarket, 22 minutes walk from the campsite. The supermarket is well stocked, including fresh veg, some funky vegan products, such as local salami ‘ham’ and nuggets at reasonable prices, and super cheap oats.

The campsite at Nida is friendly and shady, has a kitchen (bring your own pans etc) and excellent toilets and showers. In high Summer it has a cafe. As with everywhere else it is mainly campervans, but wasn’t very busy, so it was mainly ants I had to fight with for a good tent spot.

The beach is a short walk through the manmade forest. The immediate choice is women’s beach or nudist beach, so modest men and enbies have to walk a bit further north. No dogs allowed, but the campsite said that only applies in high season, so Baspie dog had a fine time.

Walk South a decent way on the nudist beach and you come to the Russian enclave border, looking towards Kaliningrad. You can enjoy baring your all to the current aggressive power. Even by road no one seems to head this way.

Nida was a sociable campsite, thanks to good shared facilities and many Germans. Whether English speaking or not, they all were friendly. Mainly older couples in campervans given the time of year. Four of them and 3 dogs let me and Railway Dog join them on a 7am 3 hour hike. I’d travelled so long with little in the way of common language and conversations with strangers since Italy, that this was bliss.

The lagoon had massive patches of yellow algal blooms. Next to these were many washed up dead fish. They must have suffocated from the lack of oxygen in the water. In the Baltic, especially a trapped area like this, pollution from agricultural runoff is a serious issue, including causing such blooms, leaving much of the area seriously depleted in underwater biodiversity. Mass deaths like this are apparently common.

Nida forests and sea smell great. There is a relaxed clean simplicity to the place. It is more beautiful than photos can show, especially off season without crowds. We could have happily stayed a couple of days longer. But we were far from home with only a few weeks to go before our Schengen allowance runs out.