Time for Riga......well, only for four hours

My last visit to Riga was generally spent here
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Day 14

I'd been to Riga before so the place should have been rather familiar. However, my previous visit to Riga was about 5 years ago on a very cultured stag do and so I only was aware of where the local ale houses were.

The first thing to do was to book my bus ticket to Lithuania. The bus was in 4 hours time so I had 4 hours to immerse myself in Latvian culture - should be ample time(?!).

Going head to head with heads
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Riga was really beautiful and to prove it, the place had the tourist seal of approval (ie lots of tour groups taking up lots of room). I had a walk in a park, saw the freedom monument and ventured into the Russian Orthodox Cathedral. As usual with lots of churches, it had a sign saying no photography. Usually, most churches are lapse on it but I decided not to take photos in this place as it had a security guard inside. Dear me, in these troubled times, even God needs protection.

I had the time to stroll around the main churchy monuments that make up the Riga skyline. As I was feeling peckish, I went into one of the famed Lido restaurants which are basically buffet style eateries. Even here, there was a sign saying no photos - they must be somehow worried that flash photography is going to turn the food off or something. Thankfully, their photo ban must work as the food was rather tasty.

The monumental freely stading Freedom Monument
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On my walk, I passed a camera crew filming a scene on a street corner. I got rather bored of watching as they kept filming the same scene over and over again. I think that the director should have had a 'I work with Amateurs' t-shirt on.

And that was the whistle stop tour of Riga - I was surprised by how nice the place was. Maybe next time I'll spend 5 hours here.