My morning challenge today was to try and wake Felix up for a run before breakfast, as there were complaints in Tallinn. After several attempts on our travels to get him to join me I had given up, as each time he had rolled over and gone back to sleep! Today was successful however, and having an apartment on the river meant the route was an easy choice. We ran west, along the riverbank, hoping to see some cruise ships in berth, but no luck. The river was calm though, and I was told off by Felix for stopping to take photos!
Due to the weather forecast, we decided to get out fairly early, and to do the work/schoolwork later. Yesterday's schooling had included planning the Riga vlog, so our tour around the city on foot was based around places the kids had identified.
Riga isn't too big, and our 4.5 mile route was long enough to see the highlights. Our plan to carry a packed lunch quickly changed to visiting the small shop (recommended by our host) to buy some Latvian pastries. I had visited yesterday, and using some good sign language managed to buy several unspecified savoury items for lunch. Today more sign language ensued, and we added sweet pastries for dessert. Total €5 for lunch for 5 people, not bad!
Next stop was the Latvian Science Academy, with plans to record some footage outside, and travel up to the 17th floor viewing platform to see the views and record some more. Sadly we weren't allowed to use the stairs, so Felix stayed on ground floor while the rest of us went up. Most of Latvia is lower than 100m above sea level, so from our viewpoint at 65m, we could see a very long way.
After returning to Felix, we sat outside on a bench to admire the building, and decided that lunch dessert needed reassigning into snack, to make sure we had enough energy for sightseeing. After our high viewpoint, we knew which direction to head for the old town. Our fair usage of roaming data is starting to run out now, so we relied on a combination of meandering along interesting streets and Jowan with Google maps to navigate to the places we wanted to see - the Cathedral, the House of the Blackheads, and the Freedom Monument.
As usual, Emily spotted a shop belonging to one of the main Latvian chocolate producers, so the food stocks were replenished, and we had lunch in the square by the House of the Blackheads.
Our meandering also led to discovering a shop selling a Riga product called Black Balsam. We're not sure what it is, but it's 40%, and we have a small bottle destined for a tasting later!
The final place on the list was Riga Central Market, one of the largest in Europe. A huge array of produce, so of course we were obliged to find something to eat. A kilo of cherries was €2.20,then back to pastries again, we bought a savoury item each, and then a big sweet item, probably big enough for 10 people! We also discovered a small bar, and bought two large bottles of kvass to try later. This is a brewed rye drink, with less than 1% alcohol. It tastes a bit like drinking bread, not to everyone's taste!
So home time, and today's school subjects include writing about yesterday's experience at the holocaust museum, reading Animal Farm for later discussion, and Lithuanian, ready for Kaunas tomorrow.
Before that, there's a football match to watch. Today's commentary will be in Latvian - we've been lucky in a couple of places with magic tellys that can change language, but not here. The coverage is interesting, at half time there is no analysis, just replays of previous match highlights, and only a couple of adverts. Good luck England!
Published on Tuesday 3 July 2018
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