On the eastern edge of Vilnius Old Town, the castle hill, a riverside park, two Gothic churches and an artists' quarter sit within a short walk of each other. This guide covers five places along that line: the National Museum of Lithuania in the New Arsenal, Gediminas Tower on the hill above it, the Bernardine Garden, St. Anne's Church and the Angel of Užupis. All five are stops on our Vilnius scavenger hunt, which saves this part of the city for its second half.
National Museum of Lithuania (New Arsenal)
The museum's story begins in 1855, when Count Eustachy Tyszkiewicz founded a Museum of Antiquities in Vilnius, devoted to the history and culture of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and built largely on private collections. The National Museum of Lithuania as such was established in 1952, and in 1967 it moved into the New Arsenal, a long building at the foot of the castle hill that belongs to the Vilnius castle complex.
Today the museum has five main departments, covering history, archaeology, ethnography, coins and images, with around 800,000 objects in all. The New Arsenal holds the main historical displays, and the museum also runs the Old Arsenal nearby and the exhibition inside Gediminas Tower, so one visit can lead naturally up the hill. The New Arsenal is a stop on our scavenger hunt.
- The statue of King Mindaugas, the only crowned king of Lithuania, in front of the museum.
- The Old Arsenal nearby in the castle complex, another branch of the same museum.
Gediminas Tower
The hill above the museum rises steeply from the riverbank, and on its flat top stood the Upper Castle. Grand Duke Gediminas, who ruled in the early 14th century, built the first wooden fortifications here; Grand Duke Vytautas completed a brick castle in 1409. What survives is the three-storey brick tower, rebuilt in 1933 by the Polish architect Jan Borowski, and a few stretches of wall.
The tower is one of the strongest symbols of Lithuanian statehood. On 7 October 1988, during the movement that led to independence, the national flag was raised on it again, and it has flown there ever since. Inside is a small museum with finds from the hill, models of the Vilnius castles from the 14th to the 17th centuries and old weapons, and the platform at the top looks over the Old Town. You can walk up or take the lift. The slopes of the hill suffered a series of landslides in the 21st century and were stabilised between 2017 and 2022; check which paths are open before you go.
- The view from the top: the cathedral and the rebuilt Palace of the Grand Dukes below you, and the red roofs of the Old Town stretching south.
- The flag on the roof of the tower.
Bernardine Garden
Between the castle hill and the Bernardine monastery, on the left bank of the River Vilnia, lies the Bernardine Garden, a park of more than nine hectares. It takes its name from the Bernardine friars, Franciscans whom King Casimir IV invited to Vilnius in 1469. The Russian authorities closed the garden in 1864; some twenty years later the townspeople won it back and it was laid out again. Destroyed in the Second World War, it was rebuilt in the Soviet years as the Youth Garden, and its present form dates from a reconstruction finished in 2013.
The design brings back the monastery's past. One part is a botanical display with plants arranged by groups, around a small pool of water plants; another recreates a monastery garden with medicinal herbs, vegetables and tea plants, a small fountain and a pergola covered in climbers. The Bernardine Garden is a stop on our scavenger hunt.
- The main fountain, which in the warm season puts on a light and music show in the evenings.
- The giant chessboard and the chess and draughts tables.
- The riverbank along the Vilnia, with the towers of the Bernardine church rising behind the trees.
St. Anne's Church
St. Anne's is a small church that looks almost like lace made of brick. It was built between 1495 and 1500 on the initiative of Alexander Jagiellon, using 33 different kinds of brick, and painted red. Nobody knows for certain who designed it: it has been credited to Michael Enkinger or to Benedikt Rejt, but no written source confirms either. A well-known legend says that Napoleon, passing through Vilnius in 1812, wished he could carry the church to Paris in the palm of his hand. St. Anne's is a stop on our scavenger hunt.
- The facade, where bricks of different shapes form slim pillars, pointed arches and window-like panels.
- The much larger Gothic Church of St. Francis and St. Bernardine right behind it, part of the same ensemble, and the neo-Gothic bell tower from the 1870s beside it.
The Angel of Užupis
Across the Vilnia from St. Anne's lies Užupis, whose name means 'beyond the river'. The first bridges across the river were built in the 16th century, when most of the inhabitants were Jewish. In the late 1990s artists who had settled in the run-down district declared it a republic, on 1 April, with its own constitution and even its own ministers. The constitution, with its 38 articles and three mottos, is mounted on a wall in Paupio Street in 23 languages; read a few of them, as they are short and often funny.
- The bronze angel blowing a trumpet on a column in the main square, by the sculptor Romas Vilčiauskas, unveiled on 1 April 2002; it replaced a temporary sculpture of an egg. The angel is the last stop of our scavenger hunt.
- The bridges over the Vilnia, where you cross from the Old Town into the self-declared republic.
How to see them in one walk
Start at the New Arsenal at the foot of the castle hill and visit the National Museum. Climb the hill, or take the lift, to Gediminas Tower for the view, then come down on the river side into the Bernardine Garden. Leave the garden at the monastery end and you are at St. Anne's Church and the Bernardine church. From there cross the bridge over the Vilnia into Užupis, walk up to the Angel and finish with the constitution on Paupio Street.
See Vilnius with World City Trail
Our Vilnius scavenger hunt turns the Old Town into a game you play on your phone. The route links 10 stops, from the Gates of Dawn to the Angel of Užupis, and the New Arsenal of the National Museum, Gediminas Tower, the Bernardine Garden, St. Anne's Church and the Angel are all stops, along with Town Hall Square, Literatų Street, Vilnius Cathedral and the Palace of the Grand Dukes of Lithuania. At each stop you solve a puzzle and learn a story, at your own pace.
There is also a self-guided walking tour and an outdoor escape game in Vilnius, for people who prefer a different format.
Play the Vilnius scavenger hunt →
Take the self-guided walking tour of Vilnius →
Play the outdoor escape game in Vilnius →
Facts checked in October 2026.