Latvia

We arrived in Latvia a few days ago, visiting the ancient capital in Cesis before setting up camp in Sigulda, the 'Switzerland of Latvia' because it has a valley with a drop of a good 120 metres or so. It was the first night of camping with proper rain, and I'm pleased to report that the REI tent held up admirably. We visited Salaspils, the site of a concentration camp, which was a very powerful place, with a clock ticking time encased in black marble and a hash mark for every death in the camp. We continued on to Jurmala, an area with 32km of interrupted white sand beaches and on the edge of the Kemeri National Park. Si spent some time recuperating from his man-flu while I wandered around. We walked in the park the following day before visiting Riga, a lovely city all done in Art Nouveau buildings.

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After visiting the very good Jews in Lativa Museum and the Museum of the Occupation in Latvia we decided to have a beer -- in the Kimmel-sponsored cafe! It's obviously the name of a brewery in Riga, so we drank their Rigas beer the whole time. We then had dinner at the garlic restaurant (including whole cloves of raw garlic). The next day I started to come down with Si's lurgie so we had a gentle drive to Valaspils, the 'Dallas of Latvia' with its enormous port transporting oil. We spent the day swimming in the freezing cold Baltic Sea and shopping for our BBQ. We camped in the middle of a forest and then carried on to see the widest waterfall in Europe in Kuldiga. We then went to Liepaja for cow-spotting, in search of the rare Latvian blue cow (reputedly only 28 of them around, the legend is that a mermaid brought them from the sea). Latvia's been fun, but the Latvian people have bumped the Greeks off the top of my list for being the most rude and unhelpful and unsmiling people of any country I've visited! E