Rest in Riga

PLEASE SUPPORT MY RIDE BY MAKING A TAX-DEDUCTIBLE CONTRIBUTION TO the Parkinson's Disease Support Network of Ohio, Kentucky and Indiana. Follow this link:

http://www.pdsnoki.org/

Fundraising Goal: $9,000, or $9 per kilometer!!!

-----

Now 210 miles into the trip, I woke up in Sigulda, Latvia, finally feeling pretty sore. I had planned to cycle the remaining 40 km from here into Riga, and after the climb I had to make to get here, I thought it might be a good downhill ride. But I was out of clean clothes and when I walked outside it again looked like it might rain. More importantly, it was end-of-autumn cold -- perhaps in the mid-40s (what my brother and I always used to call "football weather"). I decided this was a recipe for getting a fever and so I packed everything up and checked with the front desk about trains to Riga. They ran every hour and so I ambled my way over to the train station and headed for Riga by train. At first I felt like that was cheating, but then I realized that this was mainly to come back west over the eastward ground I covered up north by car when I stayed at the rural homestay outside of Salacgrīva, so it was kind of the yin to that yang.

Around here, it is totally fine to bring a bike on a train, but the bike also needs a train ticket. So for 1.44 lats, I had both tickets and waited 30 minutes in Sigulda's very Soviet-looking train station for the train to Riga. Because it was so cold, and because I was planning to wash even the clothes I was wearing once I arrived in Riga, I wore a whole cycling outfit under my street clothes (I had hand-washed this one outfit the night before). The jersey was white and it came through the collar of my black shirt in a way that looked almost like a priest's collar. I am sure people wondered who the heck this cycling foreign priest was with 3-days' stubble.

Anyway, the train slowly filled up as we made the 10 stops into Riga, mainly with people carrying massive baskets of beautifully colored mushrooms they had picked in the forest. The countryside was flat and pretty, with acre after acre of pine forests.

When we arrived in Riga, I took the bike over to my hotel. This place, the KB "Bed & Breakfast", is perfect. I'm right in the center of things here, the staff is helpful and I seem to be the only person who wants to use this computer. It is also, I should mention, on the 5th floor off of a beautiful old pre-war staircase, so picture me carrying the bike up 4 flights of elegant stairs to get here. This was how I knew that I must have tendinitis in my left Achilles tendon. It feels fine generally, but it really hurts when I'm on stairs.

The hotel offered me a room with only shared facilities for 25 lats, one with a shower in the room and a WC just outside for just a little more, or one with a full bathroom for a LOT more. Naturally, I took the middle one and it is hilarious. I have a huge window onto the main drag, Barona Street, and then the very nice and modern shower has been built into the closet. The ceilings are high and there are literally 4 full beds in this room. Maybe they thought I was hosting a party, or that the bike needed to sleep, too, I don't know.

Anyway, I had tons of errands and Internet-related matters to catch up on in Riga, and I have already done my first round of laundry, thankfully. That was also pretty funny, because I decided to come back to the hotel while the laundry was going, so as not to lose the time, which meant I was walking around the streets of Riga in a short-sleeved cycling outfit and street shoes (since my street clothes were in the wash, too) while everyone else was bundled up in coats. Got a lot of funny looks, I'm sure.

On Friday, I spent about an hour cleaning two more days of rainy grime off the bike and getting caught up on things. Then I spent the afternoon getting errands done and seeing Riga's gorgeous old town. I expected it to be less spectacular than Tallinn, but it was quite the opposite. I guess Riga has always had a thriving merchant class, so the town has fantastic, interesting "bourgeois" architecture in addition to its churches and cathedrals. And things are pretty convenient: After some searching, I found a computer microphone for Skype, a specialized USB cable for my camera (thus the addition of photos to these posts), the latest issue of the Economist and a good cup of coffee!

What I did not find was a bike shop, surprisingly. The woman at reception at the hotel told me she knew of an "exclusive bike shop" in the old town and showed me the street. Strangely, she also told me I could get a good tattoo while I was there. I didn't really know how to react to that, and when I got there, I couldn't find any bike shop at all. Later, I realized that she probably thought I meant a motorcycle shop.... Anyway, I gave up and went to a general sports outfitter nearby. They had nothing, but they said that if I was willing to take a long tram ride, I could go to their bigger store, which had a bike section. It turned out to be really easy, so I hopped tram #6 and went to the outskirts of town.

There I found the "big box" version of what must be Latvia's Walmart, Elkor. I found this very modern place right next to a Soviet era building that reminded me of VDNKh in Moscow, for those who know it (the old exposition grounds) and a section with rides for children on the parking lot. It was a HUGE store (maybe 1 square km) and the bike section alone was the size of their other store in the old town. After perusing their section of Kalashnivoks (toy, I assume...), I found some great long sleeve jerseys on sale, as well as a cheap but good windbreaker and some cycling gloves. These turned out to be lifesavers for Saturday's ride, on which more in the next post.

When I got back to the hotel, I planned to get online again and found that these two women I had seen at breakfast were online, so I waited my turn patiently. Listening to them speak to each other, I really couldn't figure out where they were from. While waiting, I started working on folding my Baltic States map inside out to use for the rest of the ride in Latvia and Lithuania, and this piqued their curiosity about what I was doing. So we eventually got to talking and I discovered that they were from the far north of Norway. Mona and her daughter Anki were there on a "girls trip" to Latvia for a week. They were having a good time and had just decided to extend the trip by a few days to go to the spa and the white sand beaches at Jūrmala.

We chatted for a while and then decided it would be fun to go to dinner together. Anki's cousin had recently been to Riga and had recommended a fancy-ish restaurant on the other side of the Daugava River called Fabrika, so a few hours later we taxied over and had a VERY nice dinner:

http://www.rigaoutthere.com/en/show/event/423

Before we went, Mona and Anki showed me their room because it had this amazing little corner alcove with all windows overlooking the main street in Riga. We had a quick predinner drink -- a shot of Riga's Black Balzams (on which more below). Turns our they also had the same mysterious 4 beds in their room.

There were, well, a few quirks with the service at Fabrika. The waiter brought Anki the wrong dish, the balsamic vinegar he brought to the table was surrounded by a swarm of fruit flies and there seemed to be a hole in the wall near our table, as there was a terrible draft at our feet. But the food was DELICIOUS. We also had a great time chatting and then decided to go out for Riga Black Balzams, the local drink, after dinner in the old town:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riga_Black_Balsam

We went to a fake 18th Century place that served only Balzams and it was a lot of fun. We had shots of it and had it in cocktails as well. Despite the fact that it tastes somewhere between the bitterness of Gamal Dansk and spicy darkness of Jaegermeister, the Balzams Black Mojitos were darn good. We got good and drunk and then headed back to the hotel in the freezing cold at 2 am. They both had a great sense of humor and I was so glad to have met them. And it was nice not to have to eat alone with a book for a change!