Thursday 12th August mileage 5197 Riga in Latvia

Weather hot in the morning then rain later.
Didn't sleep well last night and realise I will have bruises all along my forearms and inside my thighs from the Tarzan experience yeaterday.  Lovely morning everything dried from last nights clothes wash. tent bone dry when packed away.  Agreed with the security guard that I can leave my bike next till his hut all day and he will keep an eye on it.  Haver location of city library marked on a map so off I go to explore Riga.  Early morning commuters going to work, lots of very good looking young women.  Riga old town is dominated by electric trams along the streets.  there are the old ones which run on rails and then the new style electric buses that just run on tyres.  They even have a wshing tram that sprays water onto the lines, and a woman sweeping the rials to keep them clean.

Had a coffee and McFlurry in the early morning sunshine and then went to the library at about 10:00am.  The entrance was dark and dingy, but upstaitrs it was all bright and looked like new computers etc.

Woman at the desk said yes I can get on the internet, but not until the libray opens at 12:00.

The library opens from 10:00 on Saturdays, 11:00 on Monday, Wednesday and Fridays, but 12:00 on Tuesdays and Thursdays !!  So back out to see the sights of Riga for a couple of hours.

Riga seems very old, but loved and looked after. The city seems to be well cleaned and serviced with open green areas in the city.  When you go into a museum or library type building the entrance seems very derelict, but then beautiful inside.  There are designer outlet places like Georgio Armani etc. but much less than in western cities.  I like it. It seems more suited to people just going about there everyday lives than our consumerism cities where the objective is to get money out of your pocket into theirs!!   There are nice statues at the park entrances et. but not sure what they are all commemorating.  There are also open top type hop-on-hop-off bus tours of the city.  Here is a selection of images of Riga that hopefully give a feel for the place.

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Homeless looking tramp tyope person in the park.  we had a very limitted conversation in french about the time, weather etc. then he asked me for money.  On his way he was asking everyone he passed for money, but no takers. Same issue as the UK if you give money are you encouraging that behaviour, anyway left feeling I had done the wrong thing and should have given him something !!

At 12:00 went to the library and now there is a queue ! I thought that I might not get on to a machine, but there werer about 12 machines so got one ok.  You need some form of id to use the machines in public libraries, I assume it is to controll downloading of porn etc.

blog all updated, I sent Dani a happy birthday message with a picture of me with a beard.  Got an immediate replt from Dani who is in Brighton with Savi, saying Savi is not sure about the beard !!!

Got back to the campsite at about 15:30 and changed into motorcycling clothes and off to Lithuania.  It is about 200km but I should get there about 19:00 hrs if all goes well.  Set tomtom for the city of Kaunas and the Metropole Hotel that gets a good write up in my travel guide.

No problems on road until about 50km from Kaunas when I rode into the most horrific thunder, lightning and rain storm.  Went trhrough the worst of it by time I had pulled up to shelter, and weather strated to clear in the direction I was going, so set off again.  Outside of jacket and trousers got thoroughly soaked, but inside tee-shirt stayed dry.  Within minutes in gloriuos sunshine, and soon the clothes were all dry again, even the leather gloves. 

On the continuing theme of roadside animals I notice that the Lithuanian red deer depicted in the roadsigns are definately prancing higher than the Estonian red deer.  Rest assured as soon as  see one I will check out it's height of prancing !!

The hotel is described as an old russian style provintial hotel, slightly run down, but very economic and an experience to be had.  Tomtom took me to the address, but no hotel obvious !!  Rode around looking for the hotel, but could not find it. Stopped and asked a taxi driver, he pointed in a direction, and when I looked confused he said he would lead me there and to follow him.  So off we go and we travel 3 sides around the block and he pulls into a back alleyway. I expected to be dodging peoples clothes hanging across the buildings.  he stopped and went to a gate that appeared to be locked.  I tried it and it openned.  he walked into the pavement area and pointed to the left.  I noticed that if I went out through the gate it could not be openned from the other side, and I was concerned I would be separated from my motorbike, which wasn't secure.  I went back to my bike and he followed me, and we saw a man in what looked like a security post.  he told us the Meropole hotel had private parking past a barrier to our left.  The taxi driver said he needed a fare for the journey  15 Lip.  I told him I had ni Lithuanian currency, he said euro ok and indicated 20 euro.  I said in fluent Russian Niet, not paying 20 euro for trip around the block.  I dug into my ;pocket and found two 1 euro coins.  He took them and held them in his hand and said " very little".  I shrugged my shoulders, he gave me the coins back and waved me  goodbye with a shrug of his shoulders.  Later I discovered there are 3.5 Lip to the euro, so at two euro I was in fact offerring him 1/2 the 15Lip he originally asked for.  Why he then said 20 euro and refused the 2 I do not know, maybe he was confused, maybe he just tried it on to see if he could get away with it ?  It seems strange that he didn't take the 2 euro.

First impression of Kaunas is that the city is very what we assume to be russian in building style, with high rise blocks of appartments on the outskirts of town.

Hotel is just as described, huge re4ceptioon and stairway.  Girl at desk very helpful, told me to park my bike right near the hotel rear entrance so they could keep it under video survailance overnight.  Room haas very high ceilings but pretty bare, but clean.

Next door there is an Erotic Museum, but unfortunately it appears to be derelict !!

Walked to local supermarket (just like a big tesco with deli counters etc.) and found atm machine so got some Lip and went for a meal at a small italian style place just along from the hotel called Pas Paulo.

Here is a picture of other diners that I am sure you want to see !!

Everyone here seems to speak russian.  The book says that Lithuania and Latvia are dominated by russian immigrants and russian is the dominant language and culture, wheras Estonia is more independant with less russian people still living there,.  Certainly Lithuania is the bread basket of the baltic states, the fields look very productive with corn being harvested everywhere.  In Estonia the dominant agriculture was forrestry.

Read the guide pamphlet that the hotel gave me and decided to go and visit the memorial to Romas Kalanta the 19 year hippy student who set himself on fire with petrol on May 14th 1972 as a protest against the soviet occupation of his country.  Also there are memorials to jews killed in the holocaust that I intend to visit.

More later.

TOR