When tired and bored in still dark Norway in February, the hormone of travelling pushed us to go somewhere cheap and southern. We managed amazingly with the first part, however didn't quite succeed with the "southern" part of our intention. Anyway, we didn't regret it for a second. Even though it was still cold, we discovered a very authentic country - Latvia.

The monument of Bremen Musicians. One of the top tourist photo places in Old Riga. For me, though, it's a call from my childhood, when we watched a USSR cartoon about those classy fellows. One of the best memories.

The Art Nouveau window on the right.

Old town is bursting with colours mainly in golden-brown spectre, which makes it look warmer and cosier even in bad weather. It also combines very different architectural styles (especially art nouveau in the old town) just next to each other, although they still remain in a harmonious composition.

One of the wooden houses near Latvian Academy of Science (a smaller brother of Warsaw's Palace of Culture and Science)

I would compare Riga to a salad of Latvian + European/Scandinavian cultures seasoned with traces of USSR influence that still feels to be present every here and there. It was extremely interesting for me, sharing the same historical past,  to see how the paths of our countries have gone.
Just roaming around the city is already a pleasure, however for the full experience, I would recommend getting a local free tours, which from our experience proved to be a great way to see Riga in all its beauty and contrast. The tour guide or I would say "our actor" was great at public speaking and what I valued the most was the places we visited: mostly outside of the heart of the city, since people always go there anyway and we got a unique chance to experience local markets full of more or less organic food from villages (Ukraine, I miss this part of you in Oslo), hear about the history of Riga canal, local port and see old wooden houses. The one we took started at 12 sharp and the meeting point was in front of St. Peter's Church.

St. Peter's Church

Russian language was still to be widely heard in the city centre, turning into more Latvian outside of the old town. Everyone we met could also interact with us in English. It was an unusual feeling of technically being in a foreign country but understanding most of the conversations of locals, which made me feel quite at home.

A nice Latvian girl welcoming tourists to the souvenir shop

Riga is full of nice little details scattered all around.



One more thing that I found very favourable was the fact that we could rent out the whole apartment via Airbnb just 15 minutes away from the "touristy" places for a very cheap price and with a very pleasant service.

Riga City Hall

On the way to the main market of Riga, that consists of 5 departments for fish, meat, groceries, fruits and other useful and tasty stuff :)