The Baltics And Now I Have Serious Question

Beautiful Women...

Flying in from Berlin on a short one and a bit hour flight got me into Riga, the capital of Latvia. This is the first of two of the Baltic states I visited, the other being Estonia. Here is also where I met up with my comrades Arnika and Tom (Arnika who has been travelling all over Eastern Europe -read her blog-, and Tom who arrived from NZ).

Stalin's Wedding Cake, Riga

When people get married they put a lock on a bridge, Riga

Getting off the plane and into Riga the first thing a typical kiwi male would notice is that there is a plethora of beautiful women. There seemed to be a good looking shela every where you looked. It didn't take long for Tom and I to devise a system of working out the percentage of girls that were very attractive and made sight seeing oh so much more enjoyable.

The new architecture of Riga

The two nights we had in Riga were spent at the hostel named Friendly Franks. This was a hostel that we'd normally have not chosen as it was run by Aussies and described as a party hostel, but Arnika booked it after a few Moldavian wines. It turned out to be a good place to stay despite the fact that there were 70 German students there on a field trip who were aloud to drink and smoke with their teachers. The first thing we received upon checking in was a free beer, and the price for a night (7 euro) was a welcoming relief from Germany. That mixed with the social atmosphere made it an enjoyable stay.

The soviet monument, Riga

The red army, Riga

We spent the next day seeing some local sights, the old town with its art nouveau streets, the free occupation museum, the huge soviet monument and the Russian markets. These were all rather entertaining and quite educational into the last 50 years of Latvian life. To then get a feel of local culture, we tried the local delicacy of dumplings (yum yum in my tum tum) and went to a soccer game. Unfortunately Latvia lost to Greece 2-0.

A cathedral in Riga

After two nights we caught the bus up to Tallinn the capital of Estonia. Again the women in my opinion were even more beautiful than Latvia. The city has a similar feel to Riga, with an old town that is good for exploring and a few sights that had Baltic influences. There is also a number of good eating and drinking joints around. Our first Estonian meal was savoury pancakes (I had grilled cheese and bacon which was a bad mistake). Later on we tried to experience the local night life. This was slightly unsuccessful, after wondering around for a while we saw a local beat-box competition that was crazy as the MC's spoke english but all had terrible accents. Arnika then gave up and went to bed without us even finding anywhere to have a drink. So we then went exploring without her, found a nightclub that was $25 to get into so chopped that, then found a big club with crazy medieval guards which also had some weird system we couldn't work out to get in. So ended up at some lounge that was rather classy but free and had a nice drink, followed by finding that all the real night life was only metres away from our hostel and had a final beer in a packed pub before calling it a night without having too much joy.

Getting my tourist on in Tallinn

Two nights in Estonia were plenty especially seeing that we were in the most boring hostel ever, Vanna Toms. Do not stay there... Then we caught the ferry across to Helsinki.

Bizzarre wall mounting, Tallinn

My impressions of the Baltic's were mixed, there is beautiful people everywhere, but the land is poor and there is little to do apart from party and learn lots about the history. But after doing this all through Germany it would be nice to be able to do something active like snowboarding or going tramping. But unfortunately the land is flat and small and we are pretty useless so sightseeing is all we did. Also the place is a lot colder than Germany. The latitude is similar to that of Scotland so temperatures were maxin out at about 10 degrees.

The main square in Tallinn

The most interesting thing was the history though, even after all of Germanys. The baltics were a inconvient mass of land between Russia and Germany so have been occupied by both countries and had years of oppression under the USSR. The land is poor and only now upon pinning itself to the EU has been able to rise into economically stable countries. It would be very interesting to stay here for a few months and get out of the main cities to see the country side where all the industry isn't located. Also would really help to learn a bit of the language so that talking to the beautiful women is possible.

A palace Csar Peter 1 built for Catherine, Tallinn

Costs:
Riga-
Hostel 2 nights: $30
Food: $25
Transport to Tallinn: $20
Soccer Game: $15
Beer: from supermarket $5 for 4, $4 for one from a bar
Tallinn-
Hostel 2 nights: $40
Food: $25
Ferry to Helsinki: $45
Hot Chocolate from a cafe in the square: $4 (best one ever)
Running Total: $4322