In a field near the village of Meškonys, north of Vilnius, a small stone marker records one of the most patient scientific projects of the nineteenth century. Between 1816 and 1855, the astronomer Friedrich Georg Wilhelm Struve and his colleagues measured a chain of triangles running from Hammerfest on the Arctic coast of Norway to the Black Sea, nearly three thousand kilometres, to determine the exact size and shape of the Earth. Meškonys, written as Meschkanzi in the old survey records, was one of the stations, and it is one of the points of the Struve Geodetic Arc, inscribed as a World Heritage Site in 2005 across ten countries.
There is not much to see: a marker, an information board, perhaps a few flowers. What matters is the idea. Surveyors climbed towers and hills with heavy instruments, sighting from one station to the next through all weathers, and calculated the curvature of the planet with astonishing precision. The arc helped show that the Earth is slightly flattened at the poles, and it laid the foundations for modern mapping.
The countryside around Meškonys is classic eastern Lithuania: gentle hills, pine and birch forests, small lakes, fields of grain and scattered farmsteads. The Neris river winds through the landscape, and storks nest on poles and rooftops in summer. It is a quiet, peaceful area, with little traffic and a slow pace of life.
Riding here is relaxed. Roads are mostly flat or gently rolling, with long straights through forests and farmland. Surfaces vary, from good asphalt on main roads to gravel on smaller ones. Kernavė, the medieval capital of Lithuania, with its hill forts above the Neris, is a short ride west and another World Heritage Site. Vilnius, with its baroque old town, is close enough for a day trip.
Nemenčinė, thirteen kilometres away, has fuel and shops. Lithuanian food is hearty: cepelinai, big potato dumplings stuffed with meat and topped with sour cream and bacon, and šaltibarščiai, a cold pink beetroot soup that is perfect on a hot summer day. Winters are cold and snowy, and the riding season runs from about May to September.