We drove through the same national park we had cycled through the day before. First stop was Roja, a small town with a big fishing port. We drove to the coast and did a bit of training on the beach. We got our rod out and did some fishing in a river. We were unsuccessful, our tackle was too big, the hook was too big too.
We packed the rod up and headed North to Kolka national park. Kolka is on a headland where the Gulf of Riga meets the Baltic sea. We found a perfect parking spot, see aerial photo below. We went for a run through the forest then out onto the beach. Its an unusual situation where pine trees grow thick over the dunes. The forest stops then the beach starts. There was a tall wooden observation tower near where we parked. We sent off Dunny's actionman figure with parachute he got for his birthday.
Then we drove south towards Ventpills. The roads we straight, good surface, thick forests either side and no other cars for miles and miles. With the tunes blaring we cracked on. Ventspills was nice, there was a massive 'Baltic Coal Terminal'. We stopped for a train arriving at a level crossing and lost count of the amount of wagons, there was some serious industry around here. Dunny climbed onto one of the many cow statues around the town for a photo. We had a nice pint in a restaurant in the basement of the castle.
We continued down the coast to find a place to park for the night. Jurkalane it was. Again a perfect spot next to a forest just off the main road. We woke up the following day and went out on the bikes through the forest. We came across some WW2 bunkers, we had a good look around them, they were linked to each other with underground tunnels. Then we found a motocross track, we had a mess about on the bikes on it.
Next stop was Liepaja. We had heard reports of a cracking beach bar so we set about trying to find it. It was good but dead, we had a pint but decided to crack on back to Jurmala. On the way back we stopped at the longest waterfall in Europe, it was really nice. We took a photo then cracked on.
We arrived back in Jurmala and contacted Juris to see if he wanted to meet for a pint. We should of known by now, Juris never turns down the offer of a pint. We went to his favourite pub for a few. We woke up the next morning to the sound of machinery. Juris' road was being resurfaced and our van was surrounded by diggers, dumpers and workmen.
We spent the day doing boring chores. Had a wash in the river. That night we had arranged to meet Stew at the train station then go to the Red Bus for a pizza with Juris' workmates. I agree with Dunny, the hot pork pizza is probably the best pizza I have ever had. We had a few beers then went to a pub, things got a bit out of hand, we ended up singing with some Swedes, Russians and Latvians, about 30 of us in total!
All in all it was a good few days.
We woke up with sore heads. We were very grateful of Juris' mother for letting us put a couple of loads of washing on. Our clothes were pretty minging. We bought some gifts for Juris' family and said our farewells.
We headed to Riga to meet the stag do boys. Being on a budget we decided to have a few predrinks in the van. We parked about 100m from the main square in an area we thought was free parking. We headed into town to meet the boys. Stew spotted the group in an outside bar. They were all sound and said we could have drinks from the money they put behind the bar. This didn't turn out well, mixed with the predrinks we had we were well and truly drunk.
We spent the following afternoon cycling around Riga to see the sites.
Then we headed to a national park North of Riga.
Rob
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