Today we head back to the Baltics, this time to the final of the three Baltic nations, Lithuania. I am very short on time, so here are five things I find interesting about Lithuania:

1. Lithuania has an abandoned Soviet nuclear power plant very similar to Chernobyl. In fact, the Ignalina Nuclear Power Plant is so similar to Chernobyl, the EU required it to be decommissioned before Lithuania was allowed to join the EU. Ignalina was also used as a filming location for the recent HBO drama series Chernobyl.

2. Apparently Lithuania has the highest number of hot air balloons per capita. It turns out there is actually a time and a place to use stock photography with balloons floating on the horizon.

3. Like Denmark, Lithuania also has a self-proclaimed, unrecognised. Formed in 1997, the Republic of Užupis has a population of 7,000 and is located within Vilnius.

4. Lithuania has a bizarre, creepy looking “Hill of Crosses”. It’s a hill, covered in over 100,000 crosses dating back to medieval times. It’s seen as a symbol of Lithuanian independence. Oh, and did I mention it’s incredibly creepy in appearance?

5. Lithuania claims to be the geographic centre of Europe and has even built a monument to commemorate this. Sadly for Lithuania, this isn’t a widely agreed-upon fact and the Estonian island of Saaremaa made a claim to be the geographic centre of Europe last week. It looks like tensions are heating up in the Baltics.