TWO DAY TRIPS FROM RIGA

 

Your visit to Riga will not be complete unless you visit some of its Baltic coastal wonders, medieval cities, manor houses or bogs.

Many of these attractions are just a stone´s throw away from the city and reachable by public transport. But taking an organized day trip can save you lots of time and bring you to some places not so easily accessible. Plus you will have the chance to meet other travelers in a relaxed environment.

During my one week visit to Riga to attend the “Women in travel summit conference” I got offered a couple of sponsored day trips, from Riga to the Latvian countryside. One of them to explore the countryside and some ancient manor houses, while tasting some of the country culinary wonders and other, to explore one of the several Latvian bogs, and practice some bog boardwalking,  a complete new experience for me.

Disclosure: This article contains sponsored content. I received both tours for free as part of the Women in Travel Summit in Riga, Latvia. Nevertheless all the opinions are my own.

Day trip from Riga: food glorious food tour

And …What does food have to do with culture? I am not a foodie and this is not a food  travel blog but believe it or not, food is a  cultural experience not to be missed when you are visiting Latvia.

Food is one of the fastest ways to enter in rapport with a culture and  get to know its peculiar details.  Our local food prime us to feel childhood feelings of family safety and connection.  And when traveling to a foreign country and sharing local food with its habitants a new communication door is open.

Tasting local foods while visiting some historical sites is the perfect combination of activities to get to know the Latvian countryside and enjoy its culinary delicacies. And this is what the tour  “Food , glorious food “ sponsored by #MagneticLatvia and  The Latvian Element offers. I participated in this tour when I attended the “Women in Travel Summit” conference in Riga.  We were a group of about 20 travel bloggers and we were used as experimental subjects to test the tour.

The tour was exquisitely organized at all detail by our tour guide Darta, who was always there to explain all the details and make us feel comfortable during the whole trip.

The tour is now live and officially running.

My personal advice is not to have breakfast on the day you take this tour as there will be plenty of good quality food offered to you throughout the day and you will not want to miss it. And be prepared for fun and meeting up new people. The tour is also a perfect setting to get  acquainted  with other travelers. At the end of the tour you will probably will have made some new friends. Have fun.

Lamprey degustation at seaside town Carnikava

Our first stop was the coastal village of Carnikava, the place where the longest river in Latvia, the Gauja, enters the sea.  It is located 25 km away from Riga and the bus ride to it offers a beautiful countryside scenery.

We visited here  Krupis Carnikavas Nēģi, a lamprey preservation and processing family owned company, where we were introduced to the fact that lamprey fish are like vampires that suck the blood from other fish and that is where they get their peculiar flavor from. 

First we tasted some grilled fish and ate them, as the Latvian do, by picking them up by the head and raising our chins up to eat them. 

We got some mysterious very strong liquor shot to digest together with the lamprey.  This was very early in the morning, around 10:00 to be precise, but despite that I never drink alcohol in the morning,  this was a good compliment to the lamprey bitter kind of taste, that I found delicious.

The feel of the spine might surprise you when eating the fish, it reminded me a lot of the grilled sardines offered in local summer festivals in Spain.

After the grilled lamprey tasting, that happened in the garden, we went inside a room and  got offered lamprey sushi. This one was sweeter flavor and we had the owner entertained us by singing a local song.

Gogelmogels homemade ice cream and coffee

After the delicious lamprey degustation at Carnikava we traveled for 44 km to arrive at Stiene, a small village where the “Gogelmogels home made ice cream factory” is located.

This was also a family owned business by a married couple who produce the ice cream with local products. Milk is supplied mainly by local farmers and the egg yolk is supplied by the couple´s own chickens.

The couple moved to Stiene in the past and started as a very small business. The factory has now grown a lot and they are currently even supplying some restaurants in Riga.

GogelMogels factory owner serving ice cream

The ice cream was really delicious and served to us with some strong flavored  coffee.

The ice cream came in five flavors: vainille, stracciatella, sea buckthorn, halvah and bee pollen. And it was simply irresistible. My favorite one was bee pollen.

We had the owner entertaining us playing some traditional Latvian music on his own piano.

The degustation happened inside the couple house but as the business is growing they are planning to have a dedicated area to receive tourists. So if you would like to have the truly local experience you should hurry up and visit this place.

We also visited the chicken farm, where the couple showed us an ingenious system they have developed to get the eggs and not letting the hens scape.

A day trip from Riga is only worth to visit this place.

Krimulda Manor

While peacefully digesting the local made ice cream we did other 45 km bus ride to get to the Cremon winery and the Krimulda Manor, near Sigulda.

Before wine tasting we had a walking tour around the Krimulda manor house, lead by the wine maker. The manor house was built in the 19th century and it became a Red Cross sanatorium for tuberculosis patients in 1922. The house was built to replace an older Krimulda Castle that burnt in the XVII century.

Today the manor is a rehabilitation center for tuberculosis patients in need of very clean air. It offers hotel and spa facilities, such as physiotherapy and massage. We did not visit inside the rooms but I read quite good things on line about the place.

The tour guide took us for a walk around the manor house so that we could see the old castle ruins and a cottage house that seems to be still used nowadays as housing.

Cremon winery

We got offered here some local wine, made of different kind of berries and rhubarb. There are not grapes in Latvia due to its cold climate and these light floral liquors are what the locals call wine.

See here on the photo below all the flowers and berries the different wines are made off.

We started tasting a very sweet dandelion wine followed by some other berries wines accompanied by some pickles and cheese. And this was a good moment on the tour to socialize and get to know each other

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All the floral wines were on sale and some of the other tour members bought some bottles. I did not, even the if the wine was delicious, as I am trying to stay out of alcohol lately. But I think this is a perfect gift to bring back home to friends who enjoy alcohol, when traveling to Latvia.

After the wine tasting and with a light head after tasting several kinds of flora wine o we walked to the cable car for the ride.

Cable car ride

The Sigulda Aerial Cableway crosses the river Gauja over the Gauja valley while enjoying a wonderful landscape.  The ride is approximately 1 km ( 1020M ) and if offers and aerial view of three medieval castles.

The scenery looked promising and I was looking forward for that ride. But as we had dinner reservation for our next stop in the tour and there was a queue to pick up the cable car, we decided to skip this part of the tour.

I am not sure if the schedule will be adjusted for the final version of the tour or this part will be simply skipped.

Malpis Manor

The Manor is an exquisite piece XIX century classical architecture, surrounded by a baroque style park and fountain with a pond and water lilies.

The first historical evidence is the former Malpis Order Castle that was exploded in the XVII century.

The Manor was purchased by Aldis Plaudis, who is still the current owner, 2003. In 2006 renovation works were launched and they were finished in August 2008.

The Manor is now used as luxury accommodation and one of the best restaurants in Latvia.

Dinner at Malpis Manor restaurant

The dinner at the Malpis Manor restaurant was a perfect conclusion for the tour as it gave us the chance to share our experiences throughout the day as well to enjoy one of the most delicate menus I have ever tasted.

For more information on menu .

I highly recommend you to take this tour during your visit to Latvia. I really enjoyed the day and I think you will. If you have some question please comment on this post and I will be happy to reply.

Into the wild, wild Latvian boglands we go

This tour was offered by Purvubrideji and #MageticLatvia

This day trip from Riga is a truly a refreshing experience that will thrill you, scare you and make you laugh. Yes!, be prepared for that and please bring wet shoes as you will be walking on a  board on a very watery an unstable area: a bog.

For me this was the first time ever walking on a bog and I did not have a clue what to expect. I was quite scared to fall and make all my clothes dirty but it did not happen. As long as you do not walk backwards you will be fine.

But just in the unlikely case you fall it is better to bring some clothes you do not care so much about and be very careful to have your electronics in waterproof casings.

But once this is arranged let´s start with the funny part.

Some information about the Kemeri bog

Kemeri bog is part of the Kemeri national park.  Kemeri is the third largest national park in the country and 24 % of its total surface is occupied by bogs.

The Great Kemeri bog, where our expedition took place, is one of the main Sulphur producing bogs around Kemeri.

Our guide was a student university who was doing research on the bog.

The bog is a great opportunity for landscape photographers. I heard a perfect time photography is a dawn as the mist tangles in the vegetation or on a sunny day.

We were not lucky enough to have either scenarios but the place is still very photogenic as you can see in the pictures here.

The bog boardwalk

The board walk is simply fun and refreshing. You must be always careful to stay on track and follow the guide as there are areas in which you could sink and disappear forever, as the guide us told us it happened to some people who entered the bog on their own.

But do not be scared. It will be safe if you follow the rules and lots of fun. You only need to be careful to never walk backwards as you might fall and make all your clothes muddy and dirty.

There are some wild berries on the bog that you can safely try and I did, but be careful as the rosemary plant that grows there is a little bit poisonous and hallucinogenic.

The guide will show you how different hues of green on the bog indicate the density level of the surface, and where you will be more prone to sink. Be careful to follow your guide instructions and have lots of fun. It is.

Warming lunch at hercogs

And to conclude the day you will get offered a local Latvian lunch at Hercogs. Nothing better than filling up your stomach after some boardwalking exercise. You will get offered some typical black balsam with your desert, which is the most typical Latvian liquor.

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