Riga, Good. It almost knocked off Krakow as my favourite city on this trip. I stayed at a hostel called Friendly Fun Franks. Almost everyone I had met had recommended it. I wasn't disappointed. It run by an Australian bloke by the name of Frank (not a coincidence) and he had Sky Sports so I was able to watch a replay of Ports win over Geelong.
The next day in between sporadic bursts of rain I managed to see quite a lot of Riga, all a bit same same, but the markets south of the city were pretty cool. Some were housed in four old Zeppelin hangers. In the afternoon I payed way to much money to fire some guns. A group of us from the hostel went to an old Russian underground bunker in the suburbs. We were met by three shady looking blokes who looked like they had enough guns and ammo to start a coup (or stop one). After a safety briefing which consisted of 'wear these ear muffs', 'hold it like this' and 'point it that way' I fired a clips worth from a Glock, a pump action shot gun and the gun that has armed every civil war since it first came of the production line, the 'Kalashnikov' AK 47.
I'm actually surprised at how accurate I was from 25m considering I've never fired anything more powerful than a .22 and I could feel my heart pounding through my chest.
The next day I got up 7am took one look out of the window and went back to bed for three hours. At 10am I thought it sufficiently sunny enough to go to Hiking around Sigulda. It was a pretty walk but I must have been bored as at least half the photos I took were of various types of Fungi. I also saw a deer and what might have been the signs of a beaver dam but I've never seen one so I'm not sure.
The next day I made a day trip out to a place called Kuldiga. It was well a little out of the way and took a while to get to but I think it was worth it. The town had a lot of old buildings that hadn't been touched in few hundred years, the longest stone bridge in Europe and at two hundred and something meters the widest waterfall in Europe though it's a probably also the smallest at about one and a half meters. Not exactly Victoria Falls.
Had an another 'Adelaide' moment when I got to talking to this bloke in the hostel bar. Turns out he lived virtually down the street from me in Adelaide, we both knew the Brokensha twins and we both worked at IGA Distribution. South Australia, one degree of separation.
Most nights I ate a place called John Lemon. The food was average but it was 5 seconds from the hostel and in some sort of Weird Science crossed with Buffy Hellmouth phenomena there was this door at the back of diner that produced stunningly attractive girl after stunningly attractive girl. The weird thing was that I never saw anyone go in there, they just came out. The music was good too.
Every night at midnight Casper from the hostel takes a group out clubbing. The past three nights I had resisted the urge to go out as I really wanted to make the most of my days but on this occasion I thought I would repeat what I did in Vilnius and pull an all nighter and catch the early bus. This works - in theory. In theory, communism works. In theory. The club we went to was pretty cool and the reputation about Latvian women is well founded. All the girls from John Lemon across the road were there and I was having a blast (and was even getting somewhere) until .... Casper bought us all Absinthe.
I don't remember getting back to the hostel but it must have been some achievement on my part as I had to navigate the streets of a town I didn't know, find the unmarked door that was the entrance to the Hostel, articulate my name and room number to such a level that a Latvian new to English would understand it, negotiate three flights of the narrowest stairs in Riga to my floor, find the co-ordination required to put a key in a lock and finally find my bed amongst half a dozen others. It wasn't all a success, I hadn't managed to get undressed or take of my shoes as I woke up in both with the unwelcome addition of someone else's camera in my pocket, the even more unwelcome taste of spew in my mouth (it was probably green if history repeats) and the realization that it was in fact passed midday and I had missed my Bus to Tartu by a good five hours.
Absinthe leads the series two nil after Scott's probably most embarrassing defeat yet.
The next day in between sporadic bursts of rain I managed to see quite a lot of Riga, all a bit same same, but the markets south of the city were pretty cool. Some were housed in four old Zeppelin hangers. In the afternoon I payed way to much money to fire some guns. A group of us from the hostel went to an old Russian underground bunker in the suburbs. We were met by three shady looking blokes who looked like they had enough guns and ammo to start a coup (or stop one). After a safety briefing which consisted of 'wear these ear muffs', 'hold it like this' and 'point it that way' I fired a clips worth from a Glock, a pump action shot gun and the gun that has armed every civil war since it first came of the production line, the 'Kalashnikov' AK 47.
I'm actually surprised at how accurate I was from 25m considering I've never fired anything more powerful than a .22 and I could feel my heart pounding through my chest.
The next day I got up 7am took one look out of the window and went back to bed for three hours. At 10am I thought it sufficiently sunny enough to go to Hiking around Sigulda. It was a pretty walk but I must have been bored as at least half the photos I took were of various types of Fungi. I also saw a deer and what might have been the signs of a beaver dam but I've never seen one so I'm not sure.
The next day I made a day trip out to a place called Kuldiga. It was well a little out of the way and took a while to get to but I think it was worth it. The town had a lot of old buildings that hadn't been touched in few hundred years, the longest stone bridge in Europe and at two hundred and something meters the widest waterfall in Europe though it's a probably also the smallest at about one and a half meters. Not exactly Victoria Falls.
Had an another 'Adelaide' moment when I got to talking to this bloke in the hostel bar. Turns out he lived virtually down the street from me in Adelaide, we both knew the Brokensha twins and we both worked at IGA Distribution. South Australia, one degree of separation.
Most nights I ate a place called John Lemon. The food was average but it was 5 seconds from the hostel and in some sort of Weird Science crossed with Buffy Hellmouth phenomena there was this door at the back of diner that produced stunningly attractive girl after stunningly attractive girl. The weird thing was that I never saw anyone go in there, they just came out. The music was good too.
Every night at midnight Casper from the hostel takes a group out clubbing. The past three nights I had resisted the urge to go out as I really wanted to make the most of my days but on this occasion I thought I would repeat what I did in Vilnius and pull an all nighter and catch the early bus. This works - in theory. In theory, communism works. In theory. The club we went to was pretty cool and the reputation about Latvian women is well founded. All the girls from John Lemon across the road were there and I was having a blast (and was even getting somewhere) until .... Casper bought us all Absinthe.
I don't remember getting back to the hostel but it must have been some achievement on my part as I had to navigate the streets of a town I didn't know, find the unmarked door that was the entrance to the Hostel, articulate my name and room number to such a level that a Latvian new to English would understand it, negotiate three flights of the narrowest stairs in Riga to my floor, find the co-ordination required to put a key in a lock and finally find my bed amongst half a dozen others. It wasn't all a success, I hadn't managed to get undressed or take of my shoes as I woke up in both with the unwelcome addition of someone else's camera in my pocket, the even more unwelcome taste of spew in my mouth (it was probably green if history repeats) and the realization that it was in fact passed midday and I had missed my Bus to Tartu by a good five hours.
Absinthe leads the series two nil after Scott's probably most embarrassing defeat yet.
actually scott last time you spewed absinthe it was red, I remember trying to get the stains out of my blouse! :p
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