Kaunas

Understand

Kaunas is Lithuania's second city with approximately 350,000 inhabitants 2009 in the municipality, but is no way a poor relation. For a time it acted as temporary capital and as such benefited from investment and the status.A visit in February is not everyone's idea of peak holiday time but it may add to the city's appeal. Yes it will be -15 degrees C outside, and yes there was snow and ice and it takes 10 minutes to dress before venturing out and another 10 to undress when you go back inside but when else do most of us get to experience that? It's not like England where one snowflake brings the transport network to a halt. Don't forget the people of Kaunas are used to it and life goes on with great efficiency. Museums have cloakrooms, everywhere is well heated and draft proofed, supermarkets have lockers to leave your coats, hats, scarves, gloves, sledges and so on and nobody minds you sipping vodka from a 200 ml bottle to keep your insides warm. As well as the usual attractions this time of year allows you to go sledging sledges from 3 LTL in supermarkets or across the bridge to the park on an island in the river to build snowmen, have snowball fights and drag huge chunks of ice up to the bridge to send crashing onto the frozen river below. You will notice that some couples had attached padlocks to the bridge with their names scratched or painted on - a custom one may have observed in Riga. The gist is pretty clear and the bridge to the park is an ideal location to continue. There is a locksmith who sells padlocks in a courtyard off the northern side of Laisves Aleja towards the eastern end - reasonably priced too. Go for the ones with the longest hasp loop as the bars of the bridge are really thick. Failing that attach yours to one that is already there! Take a note, that Lithuanian phrasebook is very useful while in Kaunas or other site of Lithuania.

Climate

The best time to visit Kaunas is from early May to late August. July has the highest mean temperature, 16.0 °C 63.0 °F. Most of Kaunas‘s annual events are held during spring and summer time. The rainy season often starts July, yet at the same time rains are short in time. Winter can be sometimes stinging cold, with short daylight hours.

Climate	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec
Daily highs °C	-3	-1	3	11	18	21	22	22	17	11	4	0
Nightly lows °C	-8	-8	-4	2	7	11	13	12	8	4	-1	-5
Precipitation mm	39	31	35	42	55	69	80	78	56	45	53	47
See Kaunas day forecast at Lithuanian hydrometeorological service

Overall, Kaunas has milder climate if compare with any major city in Lithuania. Kaunas gets less windy and rainy days than Klaipeda, and less freezing in winter, than Vilnius.

History

Between the 4th and 5th century B.C. at the confluence of the two largest Lithuanian rivers the settlement was established. In the 14th century a castle was built here. Now it is considered to be the oldest in Lithuania.

Kaunas was first mentioned in written Teutonic Knights sources in 1361, who captured the town and destroyed the Kaunas Castle in 1362. It was rebuilt at the beginning of the XV century.

In 1408 Kaunas was granted Magdeburg Rights by Vytautas the Great. While being located at the intersection of trade routes and a river port Kaunas has become one of the major trade centers in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and joined the Hanseatic League in 1441. By the XVI century, Kaunas was one of the best-formed towns in the whole country.

In XVII and XVIII centuries Kaunas was attacked by armies of Russia and Sweden several times, some parts of the city was destroyed by fires. After the partition of the Polish-Lithuanian state in 1795, the city was taken over by the Russian Empire. During the French invasion of Russia in 1812, the Grand Army of Napoleon passed through Kaunas twice, devastating the city both times.

Kaunas was one of the centres of the two Uprisings in XIX century. To suppress the local population, the Russian authorities placed a large military garrison with a formidable fortress, including many forts, artillery bastions, and fortifications. At the same time Kaunas grew as an important center of transport and industry. In 1862 a railway connecting the Russian Empire and Germany was constructed, making Kaunas a significant railway hub.

At the period after Vilnius was occupied by the Russian Bolsheviks in 1919 and captured by Poland in 1920, the government of Lithuania established its main base in Kaunas. The city became the Temporary capital of Lithuania. Between the World Wars Kaunas grew rapidly and was extensively modernised, a lot of buildings were built, representing neoclassicism, functionalism, and art deco. Kaunas become the largest city in Lithuania.

Up to the Second World War Kaunas had a significant Jewish population, who constituted about one-fourth of the city's total population. Jews were concentrated in the city's commercial, artisan, and professional sectors. Kaunas was also a center of Jewish learning.

In 1940 Lithuania was annexed by the Soviet Union. Following Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, Soviet forces fled Kaunas. Immediately before and following the German occupation of the city, several thousand Jews were killed. The Nazis eventually established the Kaunas Ghetto, which by the end of the war would be nearly completely liquidated.

After World War II Kaunas became the main industrial city of Lithuania, at the same time citizenry of the city were under continuous oppression of Soviets. After the restoration of Independence in 1990, Kaunas has become a center of logistics, transport, computer technologies, sports, and tourism of Lithuania.