Jurmala, Latvia 320km

It’s official. We are criminals! We just rode right by the check point where we were to purchase a pass into this town, Jurmala. Apparently from April 1 to September 30 you are required to buy an administrative pass for 2 euros a day to just be present here. There is a 50 euro fine but they have to catch us first. We think we are safe here in the parking lot of the hotel. Time will tell and we can plead ignorance as all the signs are in Latvian.

We weren’t in too much of a rush to get going this morning as we knew it wasn’t a long ride. We also were in a catch 22 as it was already 25C and we knew it was only going to get warmer and you can’t check into the next hotel too early either so better to wait in your accommodation as it was. At least we managed to get a bit of air into our “oven” room last night but would have suffocated without the fan.

The start of the morning was a very pleasant ride in the forest, some farm land, and minimal traffic and eventually to the water. As we got closer to the water we found every rest stop jammed with people who were trying to get to the beach. There seems to be many miles of beautiful sandy beach.

We keep seeing these grey herons. Some of them have built huge osprey-like nests in the telephone poles instead of the trees where they are supposed to.

Hmmm...anyone speak Estonian?

Roadside fauna

Again there was no need to go through customs or a border crossing leaving Estonia and going into Latvia. There are just signs indication you are leaving one and going into another, sort of like changing provinces at home. 

The traffic just kept getting heavier the further we got into Latvia and the closer to Riga, the capital. Lots of truck traffic but they pull over as far over in the lane as they can (only a two lane highway) to let people get by. Oncoming passing vehicles in your lane is thus quite common. You are supposed to move over. We had planned to go further south to bypass Riga then decided to listen to the girl (GPS) who just took us right through the center of town. It was a hot slow ride so we were glad to get to the hotel where we have air conditioning.

We were going to stay here two nights but we booked only one after getting burnt by the Estonian oven yesterday. But it turns out we can’t stay here another night because of it being booked. Oh well – off to Lithuania!

Included in today’s blog is a video clip our wrong turn on to a one way street and another racing the tram in Helsinki yesterday.