Today was mostly a travel day, with a 4.5 hour journey between Riga and Kaunas. After an unusual breakfast, which included the remnants of what we christened the 'Pineapple jelly crumble cinnamon star bread' (a bargain at E1.50 from the market) and sorting out the apartment, we set off on yet another hair raising journey through Eastern Europe.
The journey from Tallinn to Riga had been our first real experience of what it's like to drive down what is ostensibly a 2-way road with a white line down the middle and two 'hard shoulders'. Apparently we completely misinterpreted the purpose of all these lines (and the speed limit signs) and the technique is to overtake when you feel like it (even if you are a lorry) and hope that both the person in front of you and the person coming towards you move aside, and that no-one else is doing the same in the opposite direction.
James maintained his nerve remarkably well in this situation, perhaps helped by the fact that he wasn't the one who was finding himself two inches from a huge lorry blaring its horn as it overtook us, more than once. I guess right hand drive cars are a bit of a blessing in some ways!
Seriously though, I am extremely grateful for James doing all the driving - there's no way I could ever face this kind of chaos. We found the entry into Kaunas (and a 'real' dual carriageway) remarkably civilised after all that, and were also very relieved to not have to search for parking (there is a yard behind the apartment we've rented where we left the car).
The apartment itself is pretty cool and feels spacious due to a great use of space... the double pull out bed is located in a drawer underneath the kitchen! Also two of the kids have a great bunk bed 'nook', leaving Felix plenty of space on the sofa. We may well be cribbing this design for a future project...
Published on Thursday 5 July 2018
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