Sigulda and Jürmala

Thursday 7th of June

Yesterday I made a daytrip to Sigulda. It's a very atmospheric small town that has a variety of different things to offer to tourists. In additition to many parks the town has many different sights, for example statues, churches and monuments. One park was called a Walking-Stick park, as a tribute to Siguldas most popular souvenir. I spent half of the day walking around downtown, and after that I took a cable car up to a hill that offered some nice views and some trails. Sigulda is also famous for it's adventureous side. You can for example do a bungee jump from the cable car. Unfortunately it was only on weekends, so I couldn't do it. In the evening I also found the Tarzan Adventure Park. The only thing I had time and money to do was the monorail, where you go down a skiing hill in a one-man sled that lets you control the speed yourself. One thing I really wanted to try was a huge obstacle route on trees, which looked like loads of fun. I'm even considering if I should go back there tomorrow just for that... But maybe not, it was almost 1,5 hours in a bus both ways.

The Walking-Stick Park

Departure point of the "monorail".

This morning I went to Jürmala, which is said to be Baltic's own French Riviera, where the rich and the beautiful let themselves to be seen. Might as well be, but I was there early in the morning, and the place was deserted. The main walking street had a rich variety of different restaurants and shops, only thing was that they were all still closed and there were no people around. The vast beach had the exact same problem. The weather also isn't made for beach life yet. I.'m sure the place would've been more interesting in the evening, but I got bored quite quickly and headed back to Riga. Jürmala is of course also famous for it's huge amount of spas, but I didn't feel like that either.

So far I have averaged about 15 km of walking every day, and I can also feel it in my legs already. So I'll take the rest of the day off of walking and get some rest. In the evening I'll join Peltsi and his friends for some ultimate (frisbee).