You’ll Never Be The Same – Whispers From The Baltic Road

TDA Office manager Olha Kurochkina was recently helping out on the 2025 Trans-Europa Cycling Tour from Tallinn to Vilnius.

You’ll Never Be The Same – Whispers From The Baltic Road

I didn’t expect to cry in a forest in Latvia.
Or to feel seen by a song in a language I don’t understand.
Or to realize that stillness – real, extended, unapologetic stillness – might be the hardest and
kindest thing I could give myself. But that’s what the Baltics do. They don’t shout their lessons.
They whisper them. And somewhere between Tallinn and Vilnius, I began to listen.

The Soviet Scars You Don’t See (But feel)

There’s something about cycling through Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania that feels eerily familiar – if you grew up in post-Soviet country like I did. At first, it’s the visual cues: a concrete apartment block in the mist. A fading red star on a warehouse wall. The heavy, silent presence of things left behind – Soviet infrastructure, yes, but also the trauma no one quite knows how to name. But the resemblance ends there. Because here, the scars have been paved over – digitally, politically, even emotionally. Estonia, for instance, races ahead as one of the most advanced digital societies in the world. Lithuania leans into its design and creativity. Latvia glues it’s layers together like glass: fragile, visible, beautiful.

What struck me most was how quiet that transformation was. There are no monuments to pain in the forest. No street signs explaining what used to be there. But you feel it. Like muscle memory. Like a ghost that learned to walk beside you without making a sound. As a Ukrainian, I recognized it instantly. The silence isn’t avoidance. It’s survival. And – sometimes – it’s healing.

Meditation on Wheels

There’s a strange clarity that comes from long days on the bike. It’s not dramatic. It’s not even exciting, most of the time. It’s the everydayness that teaches you something:

• How to sit with discomfort and just keep pedalling.
• How to be alone with your thoughts, and forgive them when they repeat.
• How beauty can sneak up on you – in a roadside shrine, a stork’s nest, a girl selling wild strawberries in the middle of nowhere.

Cycling is a kind of moving meditation. You don’t arrive anywhere quickly – not on the bike, not in your thoughts. But you do arrive. And when you get there, you’re a little bit different than when you left. ‘The road won’t rush you,’ I wrote in my notes. ‘But it will change you.’ Sometimes I think that’s how healing works too.

Let the Forest Speak

One afternoon in Lithuania, the group had moved ahead, I was sweeping. I found myself alone – really alone – in the woods. Just birch trees, birdsong, and the steady rhythm of my wheels.

No traffic.
No war.
No alerts on my phone.

Just a country that had rebuilt itself quietly after trauma. Just a forest that had seen empires rise and fall.
Just me, remembering that being safe is not the same as feeling safe, and wondering if it’s okay to start feeling it now.

And Then Came the Cherries

Of course, not everything about the Baltics was quiet forests and introspective solo rides. On my last night in Vilnius, something entirely different happened. It started, innocently enough, with a visit to Pyana Vishnya – Drunk Cherry – the Ukrainian mono-bar I’ve somehow now made a tradition on my European trips. (Yes, it also made an appearance in my Warsaw blog. Yes, I clearly have a cherry agenda.)

What I didn’t expect were the vast amount of riders that showed up. Some came just to say goodbye. Some came just for the cherry shots (respect!). And suddenly I was surrounded – by friends, by laughter, by toasts, by hugs that lasted a little longer than usual. It felt like a second birthday. Or maybe just a moment when I realized – again – how lucky I am.

Lucky to ride with these people.
Lucky to have a job that makes my world both bigger and more connected.
Lucky to observe myself changing – not just in how I ride, but in how I relate, lead, and celebrate.

In a year of war, grief, and resilience, I ended this tour laughing in a red-lit Ukrainian bar, surrounded by people who understood. And for once, I didn’t feel the need to say anything wise or heavy. Just ‘Bud’mo!’ – ‘Cheers’ in Ukrainian.

You’ll Never Be the Same (and that’s the point)

I don’t leave the Baltics with a grand narrative. But I leave softer. Quieter, yes – but also fuller. These countries changed me – not by challenging me, but by welcoming me into their silence, their memory, and their moments of surprise joy. Sometimes, after enough miles (and maybe a few cherry shots), you realize the road you are cycling isn’t just on a map. It’s in you. And it’s still being written.

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