Riga, Latvia

This place is amazingly quaint, cute, undiscovered, human-scaled, affordable, and simply... charming! Upon landing and finding our way out of the mini arrivals terminal, we were funneled out past a sniffing dog (I made it through, phew!), and then found ourselves in front of a number of seemingly random bus stops. The first one we walked up to had two fellow backpacker-type chaps, both inquiring as to where this bus would take them. Although we had just landed in Riga, Latvia, the bus was scheduled for a couple destinations, and both were international.... One destination being Lithuania; my question being: why fly into Riga and then take a bus out front the terminal right out of the country? Oh well, my sister and I almost did for kicks :p but I'm glad we didn't because this city rocks!

The next event was our arrival at the hostel. After our half-hour shuttle that we jumped onto from the airport off of a hunch (it read Riga Centre, how could you go wrong??), we found ourselves "downtown", and only needed to ask directions once before we ended up at our waterfront view from our hostel bar :) We were instantly offered welcome drinks so we opted for champagne of course, from the finest Latvian champagne company: 'Rigas' I believe lol. So informative and helpful staff told us about everything as we settled into our new home for the next 3 days.

After our little settle-in, we decided to continue on to explore a wee-bit and were immediately welcomed to the streets of Riga with rain :) this was quite nice though, as we had been in hot Turkish sun for a while now and we had packed our umbrella just in case. We strolled around a while until we came to a little frozen yogurt shop called .... ummm... Yo Yo ( I had to good Latvian Frozen Yogurt there) and decided on some espressos and fro-yos to lift our rainy spirits :)

So after the excellent boost of frozen yogurt and espressos, we continued on to a local Rigan Mall where we purchased some groceries and  beverages (excellent selection might I add ;) If it wasnt for one stray boy (must have been no more than 17; asked me for a little favour.... I hesitated, then proceeded) he was thirsty too, and his girlfriend was accompanying him ;)     After this sketchy encounter we finished our purchases and I felt the need for a washroom. This part was a little funny to me, maybe no big deal but still a little novel just because; When I arrived at the entrance door to the washroom another young lad let me in with a mumble in Latvian language, something while he held the door open ( I noticed that the doorknob needed some sort of local currency insert under normal circmumstances), Anywho, this young lad insisted I proceed on his order without this coinage, as I did my business and exited politely with the customary nod :) He returned the nod and I jotted this kind jester in my blog book lol. I guess this guy stands there and... lets people in because they never removed the paying mechanism... Or I was supposed to tip..... :S Somehow it seemed he was just chillin and happened to be there to shed his knowledge on the matter... Just old washroom infrastructure... Iunno :s

 

Moving on... A beautiful city!

 

These shots occured on our way back from the mall where I assisted the young lad and encountered the interesting bathroom incident. It is truely an enchanting old town with a variety of cafes and eateries to explore.

This is our first day. Maybe there will be more photos soon ;)