Things to do in Dzūkija

Once you and your group have been picked up from your accommodation in Vilnius, get ready for a day filled with adventure.  From Vilnius, you will travel to Merkine, where you will head to the Three Crosses area, which acts like a gate leading to a dome and a pyramid. Spend at least a few minutes here, as it's said to have a cleansing effect. Afterwards, proceed to the dome and pyramid and after short meditation, you will continue to the Cepkeliai Marsh.  The Cepkeliai Marsh is the largest swamp in Lithuania; here you will spend some time hiking. Later, you will continue to the Grutas Park, which is an exposition of Soviet statues scattered around the park. You will have lunch either in Marcinkonys village or Grutas Park. After lunch, you will head to Liskiava Monastery Ensemble and Druskininkai resort town. In the evening, you will return to Vilnius.

During this day tour you will be able to explore the most interesting sites located in the surrounds of Vilnius. After pick-up from your hotel, the tour will start at Paneriai memorial park, where thousands of Jews from Wilna were killed. The Paneriai or Ponary massacre was a mass murder of up to 100,000 people by German SD, SS and Lithuanian Nazi collaborators, during World War II. The murders took place between July 1941 and August 1944 near the railway station of Ponary, now known as Paneriai, a suburb of what is today Vilnius, Lithuania. After the tour in the park, the group will head to the second capital of Lithuania, where today you can see the most beautiful castle in Europe, Trakai Castle, located on an island in the lake. Here you can have the lunch in a traditional Karaim restaurant, or take a boat trip around the lake. After Trakai, the group will head to one of the largest ethnographic open-air museums in Europe that stretches across an area of 195ha. The museum was established on the picturesque shores of Kaunas Lagoon in Rumšiškės in 1966. The exhibitions at the museum are intended to introduce the ethnographic regions of Lithuania, i.e. Dzūkija (Dainava), Aukštaitija (Highlands), Suvalkija (Sudovia), Žemaitija (Samogitia) and Lithuania Minor, as they looked at the end of the 18th century and the first half of the 20th century. After this visit the tour will head back to your accomodation in Vilnius.