Jurmala and Art Nouveau

Last night was't that good for me. Friday night in Old Town is apparently party time. I had though that I was far enough away from the main square to avoid the loud noise. Well, yes and no. I'm far enough that can't hear the nightclubs. Also I'm away from any routes to major hotels, the galleria closes at 10pm and it takes up all the blocks to the east of me. The stuff to the northwest corner is all closed up also and all the hotels are somewhat farther away.

HOWEVER. Apparently I am on a favorite route from the clubs at the center to the railway. Not really as the main large street is just to the north of the square, but if you wanted to take the back way around to get to central station - my window is right above that route it seems. So very loud drunks in groups would come walking by arguing about stuff until 5am. Also for some reason, the last three nights I've gotten the crap bit out of me by mosquitoes. I learned the trick though, I think. They only started bugging me when I started shutting the balcony door at night. Counter intuitive, but the little buggers must not be coming from outside. There must be some trapped standing water in the plumbing, walls, or vents. So the first three nights when I kept the door open, it was too cold for the buggers.

So now the conundrum. If I leave the door open, I don't get woken by insects buzzing in my ear and biting me. However, now I will be able to hear the drunks even louder. Cest la vie. My plane doesn't leave til 2:30pm tomorrow, so I will be able to sleep in. Kinda sucks though because other than that, this room is incredible.

So I head out to the central station to head over to the resort town of Jurmala. Burnt out and frazzled, a long walk on the beach and a stroll through a beach town sounds like just the thing the doctor ordered. When I headed to the station though, the railway timetables were not in English, the ticket agent didn't speak any, and there was some kind of sheet paper tape to the platform table saying something about the train to Jurmala. Greeaaaaatttt. From the look of things, the trains might be running very infrequently due to it being October. The ticket only cost me 2 lats, so what the hell. I was hungry so I headed in for a burger, fries, and Coke in the station. I figured that if I came out of my meal and the train was looking like it would be an hour wait, I would skip Jurmala.

Well once I got done eating and hit the platform, there was a train sitting right there about to take off. Fate gave me a cookie. Yay!

The train ride out was about 30 minutes and the countryside between Riga and Jurmala was autumn kissed trees, rivers, and farmland mostly. I got to Jurmala and it was gorgeous. You could tell it was mainly an upper class Latvian resort town. Nice houses, art everywhere,

 long beaches with white sand, and a touristy strip through the middle of town with nice shops and restaurants.

And, of course, Gamera! Friend of children, enemy of Godzilla!

I walked around for a good couple of hours, alternating between hitting the beach and the cobblestone strip. The walk helped me shake off some of the more fried brain feeling and wake up a bit more.

After the beach walks, I headed back into town in hopes of hitting the Art Nouveau Museum. I had a bitch of a time finding it as it was tucked away in a bunch of building in that architectural style. apparently, back in the last 1800, early 1900s - Riga enjoyed a kind of Renaissance where hundreds of buildings were built up. Matter of fact, so many of them were built during this time that Riga is now on the UNESCO World Heritage List. I can totally see that because over 40% of the buildings in the downtown Riga area are in the Art Nouveau style. It really is a gorgeous city. Every corner you turn around gives you a different artistic set of buildings. The only place that I can think of with anything similar would be the outer rings in Amsterdam.

The museum itself was actually very tiny. It consisted of about a dozen rooms in a house with the original furniture from that period, showing how the inside of the buildings would have looked at the time. They also had about four dozen hats people could wear while walking through the museum and all the gals working there were wearing 1900 outfits. Unfortunately they were all women's hats. I would have worn one anyway, but I had on my Scottish hat at the time.

Even the ceilings were cool.

I left there and hit up the souvenir across the street. The stuff was pretty cool so I ended up picking up a handful of things for gifts to myself and others. I got a really framed glass/ceramic art panel that I can stuff in my luggage to bring back.

Thar be dragons!!

So I headed out, taking pictures around the block of the cool buildings and stopped by the Flying Frog restaurant. It was a cool little joint with a frog based Art Nouveau interior. Had me some spring rolls with bilberry spicy chili sauce, homemade kvass (I think I need to learn how to make this - the bottled stuff sucks but the homemade stuff is tasty), and a spaghetti bolognese.

Meal accomplished, all the sights I wanted to see have been seen, and its my last night in Riga. No sleep last night, so partying is out of the question. I might go have a beer or two in the lobby, but that's it. Its hard to believe I have less than a week left. Next Saturday at this time, I'll be curled up in my bed at home with a kitteh. Maybe watching a no brainer movie or something else equally mind numbing.

Wait...its a clothing store...called Nude...BUT ITS CLOTHING...BUT ITS NUDE?!?!?