By Bus To Vilnius

a Soviet-era reminder in Riga: Latvian Riflemen Monument

On our last night in Riga, our hotel gave us a breather from the heat: an electric fan was finally available for us. We slept soundly that night and woke up to another warm day, packing our bags and getting ready for another trip on a bus. We're on our way to Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania. Since our bus wasn't leaving until noon and the terminal was just nearby, we went on an aimless walk around the old center of Riga after enjoying our free continental breakfast at the hotel.

Riga: Art Noveau

From the old part of town, we move on to someplace 'new', in Riga's Art Noveau district. Art Noveau (French for 'new art'; also known in German as Jugendstil for 'youth style'), is an art and design movement which includes architectural style popularized in many European cities from late 19th century to just before the first World War. Riga at this period of time was one of the booming cities under the Russian empire. Awash with money and talented architects, buildings and houses in Riga were constructed using this style which branched out into both Decorative and Romantic-Nationalistic Art Noveau.

Roasted In Riga

There are days down the road when the body just surrenders and you feel ill. It happened to me while in India last year and it did happen again. It started with a sore throat during our last day in Tallinn. Unfortunately, lozenges wasn't part of our travel medication kit so I ran to a pharmacy just before boarding the bus to Riga. Thankfully, I had a restful 5-hour bus journey, helped by the fact that the roads were pretty much smooth all the way - a necessity for European Union member countries.

Riga's Vecrīga

It's amazing how cities in Europe really put you through that old world feel. Riga, for one, is no exception. Just like Prague and Tallinn, Latvia's capital city of Riga has its Old Town, known here as Vecrīga (Old Riga). As our hotel was right at the very edge of this historic quarter, we only needed to walk a few steps on the the winding cobbled streets to admire what UNESCO has inscribed in 1997 as a World Heritage Site.