Dzintara Hotel Jurmala

... Another brilliant moment. (I hope people adjusted for the millions ways that things can go wrong and when things actually go smoothly it is typically the result of luck, or things actually being planned well. I definitely have my moments but am not really that big of an eff up. usually.) Fortunately I had left an hr and a half to get there, so I was still 30 min early. I loaded up on Latvian trail mix and boarded the boat. Holy ****, this ...

... time during my entire trip through the Baltics I met a truly nice person in the lady who was working in the tiny left-luggage office. And when you find someone like that, then it's no problem to ultimately understand each other, even if you speak different languages. I managed to somehow explain that later in the afternoon I was continuing my travel to Lithuania, and in the meantime I wished to leave my things for keeping. I got a piece of cardboard with a number written ...

... we were done. The train moved on and about half an hour latter we were disturbed by a Latvian customs officer who came on board with his laptop computer and fancy passport scanner. Once again we were through the customs check in a matter of 5 minutes, we got some nice stamps in our passports, and then it was back to sleep as the train got back under way. The train was scheduled to arrive in Riga, the capital of Lativa at 9:40am. We first thought that this was 9:40am Moscow ...

... to the incessant stag revellers from the United Kingdom. I really dislike their behaviour, and the way they **** on the best cities in Europe. And this pathetic excuse for a hostel was marketing everything right at these people, and not to anyone else that actually wants to experience Latvia. Anyway. We didn't have a plan in mind for Saturday, just to wander and see what Riga had instore for us. It was a nice clear day, but cold - around 1 degree. We ...

... knowing that we had travelled through city and country, on the wrong side of the road, guessing at the meaning of road signs accident free! Back at the Hostel we cooked dinner and had a drink with some of the guys we had met the night before. Saturday night kicked off properly at about 11.30pm.... apparently this is a completely reasonable time for people to finally decide that they will be going out and its going to be big. Carlos, one of the managers at the ...

... was turned into a fortress by the locals. They were trying to defend themselves from the Soviet Red Army. Many unarmed protestors were killed, and there was a documentary featuring actual footage of the events. Unfortunately, time did not permit us to view much of it. Next up was the Latvian Museum of War. There were no English descriptions, despite the guide book stating that certain exhibits were in English. Some ...

Beat a hasty retreat to Riga from horrible Parnu again on Eurolines, journey took 3 hours and and we saw lots of storks on the way, these are the baltics most representative birds. The cutest sniffer dogs got on the bus at the border with people even taking their photos. So we arrive in Riga and get totally fleeced by a taxi driver (so different to Tallinn) little did I know this would be the last taxi we'd be in until we were well at home. C. was so mad he worked out everywhere on the ...

... was weaving in and out of cars, and while terrifying us, made us hope we would get to the end of the journey quicker. The scenery was all quite flat and boring, so we ended up somehow falling asleep. As we came to the border, he just drove up the middle of two very long queues of cars, and then pushed his way right to the front. He got a telling off from the border official, and our it seemed to take longer than necessary for our ...

... from the train station, and the next local bus back was due soon. Still, Glenn decided that he HAD to climb the turret of the castle for the grand view... except, in the process there were queues inside the tight spiral staircase up the five stories! Although the view was quite good, you guessed it, Glenn arrived at the bottom too late. Making our way back quickly through the grounds... sure enough the bus had gone... and now we had an hour to sit and wait for the next one ...

This is just the intro to our trip as we started it from Riga by taking an excrutiating early flight from here to Moscow. The taxi arrived early so we rushed like crazy to make it to the airport to be an hour early before our 5:55 (AM) flight. The business class lounge wasn't even open yet, so I couldn't impose on my ...