Riga in December is festive, sparkly, beautiful and very, very cold. The first thing I noticed when we landed is just how Latvian George looks – those genes run strong! On our first day we did a two-hour walking tour around the city. In addition to Georges heritage, there was an Australian lady in our tour group who also had Latvian grandparents. With our guide we weaved around the streets, stopping to learn about the history of Latvia along the way. Latvia has a long history of by various countries including Sweden and Russia, before finally becoming independent in 1991. The population has a large Russian contingent, and most Latvians speak Latvian, Russian and English. The geographical position of Riga on key trading routes made the city very affluent historically, reflected in the beautiful architecture all over the city. For several centuries the Baltic Germans formed the upper class and formed strong trade guilds. One local tradesman was refused entry to his guild. In retaliation, he built a grand house, and on the top, he placed a sculpture of a large black, with its tail raised and directed towards the guild house. Legend had it that he was eventually forced to turn the cat around, so that it’s face was pointing towards the street, rather than its bum!

Our guide also took us to see The Three Brothers, the oldest houses in Riga.

After the tour, we dived into the closest coffee shop to defrost – at -12^oC outside, this took quite some doing. A little bit of Black Balsam, the famous local drink, helped – although it tastes a lot like cough syrup. We then wondered around the Christmas markets and local food market. We spent the last hour of daylight searching out some beautiful art nouveau buildings. Around 1/3 of the buildings in central Riga were built in this style, and it has the highest density of art nouveau buildings in the world.

The following day was blissfully above freezing. We hopped on a train and headed out to the resort of Sigulda. Although the train wasn’t brand new, the hour-long service ran on time and it only cost €1.70 for a return journey – take note SouthEastern! The train journey took us through miles and miles of wintery pine forest. Latvians are allowed to go to the forest each year, chop a tree of their choosing and take it home to decorate. The local luge track was very impressive, but sadly only open to the public at weekends. We then walked around the town and visited the Sigulda Medieval Castle. The castle has been beautifully restored and has fantastic views across the surrounding valleys.

On the final day we visited a few of the many museums in Riga. Unfortunately, the Museum of Occupation and the KGB Museum were both closed for refurbishment, but that just gives us an excuse to return in the future. We kicked the day off with a visit to the Museum for the History of Medicine. This was truly one of the strangest museums I’ve ever been to. Each floor was packed full of fascinating exhibits including a dog with a second dogs head grafted onto it, a room full of tattooed skin, pickled things in jars….There was also a lot of (slightly creepy) models of surgery and medicine through the ages. The dentistry ones were enough to put anyone off ever having a check-up again. The quality of the translations started very strongly on the ground floor but decreased steadily as you ascended the floors. What was happening closer to the top is anyone’s guess! The very enthusiastic lady at the front desk kept asking me questions in Latvian, which I smiled and nodded at. I am now the proud but accidental owner of four of the most bizarre postcards you can imagine!

We then went to the House of the Blackheads. This beautiful building was originally used as a guild for unmarried merchants.

The evenings were mainly spent in Folk Club Ala – good food, good beer and good music (although we managed to miss the live music). I was pleasantly surprised by the rye bread pudding, which is also called a soup, and is made of bread, dried fruit, honey spices and a bit of dark beer.

Overall Latvia was a fantastic destination – the locals were friendly, Riga is beautiful, the food and drinks are very nice, the museums are great and everything just seems to work. We’ll definitely be back.