Riga Travel Report

From Friday until Monday I was in > Riga (> Latvia). Since I was five years ago in > Tallinn (> Estonia) it was interested to see how is Riga. The vacation started on Thursday evening when I drove by car from > Bad Oeynhausen to > Hamburg. After a short night we flew from > Hamburg Airport with an > Air Baltic plane to > Riga International Airport. The departure luggage area at the airport is very small. To get to our hotel > Monte Kristo in the Old Town we used a Baltic Taxi. Afterwards we did a short walkabout through the old town and entered to the brasserie > 13 Kresli to eat and drink something. In the evening we were in the > Alus arsenals restaurant. We were nearly the only guests, but the food was excellent. Afterwards we went to > Paddy Whelan’s pub to watch the last minutes of the soccer game Germany against Turkey. We celebrated the victory in the > DStyle club.

On Saturday we went to the > Livu Square,  > Esplanade, > Nativity Cathedral, the Old Town, on the obervation deck at St. Peter’s Church and finally to the Central Market. In the evening we were in a restaurant near the St. Peter’s Church (<forgot the name>) and afterwards we looked in some pubs and clubs (> Skyline Bar, > DStyle, > Scandal, Rockabilly which was near our hotel …).

On Sunday we drove by train to Majori (> Jurmala). It was impressive to see that nearly each railway car has its own conductor. The beach of Majori is very long, but unfortunately it has no seafront. In the city we ate something at My Life cafe. Back in Riga we went to the > Taverna Dzintara cels where we ate something. The food and atmosphere was good and better than on Saturday.

On Monday we visited the St. James’s Cathedral, but you have to pay an admission. Afterwards we went to the Three Brothers. Since the Skyline bar was closed we went to a restaurant (<forgot the name>) near the main train station and ate something. The food and service was excellent. Afterwards we drove by taxi to the airport and flew back to Hamburg. From there I drove by car to Bad Oeynhausen.

Recommondations:

• Our three bed room at Hotel Monte Kristo was large and quite. The hotel staff was friendly and the breakfast was good. So I can recommend the hotel.
• If you need a taxi you could use Baltic Taxi since the fare is fair (7 LVL from airport to our hotel). A friend used another taxi and paid 17 LVL.

Summarized the weekend trip was nice and Riga is a lovely city for travelling a few days there.

More pictures on my Flickr page: > Riga 2010