Riga with the Fam

[July 4 - 9]

Near the end of our stay in Riga, my parents showed up for a brief vacation with us. While some of our time was spent re-visiting the "best of," we had a great time showing off the sights like locals.



[Marita takes over the post from here.]

We took a day trip out to Jurmala, the local beach. Dean and Sam tried out some frisbee on the beach. Sam was actually pretty good! We left after an hour because a big rain storm was moving in.


Sam and Dean practice throwing

We moved out of Ieva's apartment and stayed with the Stevens in Hotel Centra. Earlier, we had found a magazine article with Ieva's apartment featured for it's great design. I was so excited that I took a picture of the article.


Ieva's designer apartment

The hotel was really posh with the best breakfast included. We had fun lounging on the leather couches underneath the modern artwork.


Lynn and Dean at the Centra

The view from the rooms was great too and we took lots of photos when the sun set around 10:30 pm.


Sunset over Riga

We took a trip out to Cesis on the last days. One the way, we stopped at Turaids, home of a castle and sculpture garden. Right before we got there, a cop pulled over Dean and yelled at us for 10 minutes about not having an international driver's license. Luckily, as foreigners, he let us go with a warning. Phew.


Lynn and Dean at Turaids Castle


Turaids Sculpture Park

Right before Cesis, I dragged everyone out of the car to see Araisi. It is a lake with a reconstructed sunken log fort from the 9th century. Dean and I posed for a picture on the boardwalk to the area.


Marita and Dean at Araisi

In Cesis, we chilled in the house and then went into down for a nice dinner.
The next day, we toured the castle again. We had been here with Ashley already, but this time the museum was open and we could see some great displays. Students were out in the castle yard on an archeological survey. They had just found some more old coins.

Hardhats and lanterns were required so we took some fun pictures inside.


(Sam), Lynn and Dean in the Castle

Next to the castle, you can tour the metal shop. An older man recreates old Latvian designs and copies coins that were once minted at the castle hundreds of years ago.
He had a demonstration where he dressed me up in all the traditional jewelry, complete with the outfit. I had to put it over my pants, but you get the idea. It was quite heavy to wear the layers of bronze on my neck!


Marita tries on traditional jewelry

Thanks to Sam and Lynn for a fun visit!