Tues 16 - Yesterday we had more of a look around the old town of Riga. In one of main squares there is beautiful ornate building with a restored façade, called the House of Blackheads. It was originally built in 1334 for the city’s guilds. Over time, the blackheads, a guild of unmarried foreign merchants became the sole occupants. Their name derives from their patron, St Maurice (who was often depicted as a Moor) and they were known for their riotous parties. The façade includes an astronomical blue clock. The building was devastated by bombing in 1941 and the Soviet authorities demolished the remnants 7 years later. The current structure now dates from 1999. In its past, the composers Richard Wagner and Franz Liszt visited the original building which included a concert hall.
We saw the changing of the guard outside Freedom Monument, which was a very understated affair. We have never seen any guards standing so still as these ones were. We walked to the Opera House which is a very impressive building with large columns, and the most wonderful flower beds out the front.
The rest of the day was pretty much just wandering around, and looking at a couple of shopping areas. For any young lady who wants to buy clothes, bags, shoes etc, the Galleria shopping centre is the place to visit. We really needed to stoke up our batteries, as we are still trying to shake off the last of the colds, so we took it easy. We decided to visit St Peter’s church to go up the tower to see views over Riga. However by the time we got there, it was threatening rain and the clouds were getting a bit dark. As it happened, we stumbled across a rehearsal for a concert being performed by a youth orchestra. They were absolutely wonderful. We listened for the best part of an hour then went back to our hotel, deciding to postpone the tower till tomorrow.
Wed 17 - Today we had a tour guide take us to Rundāle Palace, which is over an hour’s drive from Riga. The palace was built in two periods, from 1736 to 1740 and from 1764 to 1768. It is considered to be one of the finest palaces in the Baltic region. The palace suffered damage during the 20th century and the rooms have served as government offices, an elementary school and a granary. Restoration began in the Soviet era in 1972 and is still in progress. On top of the palace, on one of the chimneys, a family of storks has built a nest. They come back every year to the same nest! There are extensive gardens around the palace, with wonderful roses (including rose bushes dating back to around the early 1800s. The rose gardens reflect one of the rooms in the palace called the Rose Room, which has some beautiful floral motifs of roses on the walls and the ceiling. The gardens have been recreated from the original plans (which we saw today) and were to include three fountains but at this stage, there is only one fountain and two ponds. The interior has been restored as close to the way it was. There are two Dutch fire stoves which are original but the others are recreations. The gold hall and the white hall were the grandest rooms in the palace. We saw similar stoves in the palaces in St Petersburg. Some amazing restoration work has been done on the parquetry flooring, which had suffered lots of damage and now are back in original condition.
On the way back to Riga, we visited the ruins of the Bauska castle, which stands on the narrow peninsula at the confluence of Mūsa and Mēmele the rivers where they form the Lielupe river. It is a 15th century castle, and when you climb up to the top of the tower, you have lovely views over the area.
The tour guide we had was very interesting and told us lots of interesting things about Latvia, including information about the economy, salaries, employment etc, and funny stories about Latvian life and the ways people try to get the most for their money, (especially when purchasing things such as fuel or alcohol, which is mostly cheaper across the border). Latvia is part of the European Union and will be adopting the Euro from January 2014. They currently use the Latvian Lats, with 1 Lat equalling about 1.50 Euro. People are a bit afraid that everything is going to cost more once they move to the Euro but the Government are apparently being firm about businesses keeping their prices the same after the conversion.
After returning from the tour, we went off to St Peter’s church and did actually go up the tower this time, to see the views, and it was well worth it. We have found Latvia to be very flat, apart from the area around Sigulda which we visited a couple of days ago. Finally we went to S John’s church and it just so happened that the organist started rehearsing music, so we sat down and listened. It was a fabulous sounding organ and we were so pleased we heard it. We were so intent on the music that we didn’t realise the lady was locking up the church, and when we got up to leave, she had to fossick through a bag to find keys to unlock multiple doors to let us out the back. At least we didn’t have to sleep the night there!
Tomorrow we are off to Liepāja (pronounced differently to the way it appears). I looked up the pronunciation on Google before we set off to the bus station to buy our tickets, so I got the pronunciation right! Ordinarily, we would walk to the bus station with our bags as it is not very far, but the extremely uneven nature of the cobble stones, plus having to go up and down steps, and across tram lines to get to the bus station, didn’t sound like a very desirable option - so we have ordered a taxi instead (very unusual for us).
