Latvia

Our trip started on the wrong foot when I was picked out of the line at the Bristol airport because my carry-on was too big to be carried on. Not only was I annoyed to have to pay to check the bag, but I lost my spot and about 5 more Latvians cut in front of my family (I repeatedly learned on our trips that Latvians are polar opposites to the orderly Brits who always politely que up). The downsides to the cheap tickets on RyanAir is that there are no assigned seats and they make their money off of checked bags and other extra charges.

We were picked up in Riga by Gita and Anta, Rachelle's cousin and goddaughter. The kids and I used our Latvian 'hi' (sweiks) and 'thank you' (pauldies) and then let the 3 of them began yammering away in Latvian.

When we woke at Hotel Tia the next morning, Rachelle realized that she had left her carry on, with all of her clothes, on the plane. So, with Rachelle dressed in Noah's Real Madrid shirt and shorts, we enjoyed breakfast at our hotel, which was a great Latvian spread of dark rye and other traditional breads, fruit, eggs, and different dishes of veggies with sauces. Anta had the day off and served as our tour guide around downtown Latvia. Riga is an 800-year-old city with a variety of colorful and beautiful architecture. The city is a mixture of stone, earth tones, spires, bright wooden buildings, and bridges over the river. There are clear influences from the many years when Riga was under German and Russian rule.

After exploring Riga, we took a bus to the airport to retrieve Rachelle's bag - they found it on the plane and were holding it for her! - and pick up our rental car. After stopping by Hotel Tia so Rachelle could shed Noah's clothes, we headed to Lido, a combination restaurant and amusement park (http://ac.lido.lv/index.php?lang=en&sad=1). We found Gita, Anta, Toms, and Inese (Gita's son and his wife), picked out some food from the buffets, and found a table in the building that seats over 1000 people. After dinner, the kids, Toms, and I went to the amusement park. Liv enjoyed the rides that took her high in the air and Noah preferred the shooting games. All of us took part in the cannon room, where you are situated at an air gun and can shoot spongy balls at each other. There are 4 guns on each side of the netted room. Although the balls are soft, they do slightly sting, especially when they hit your face. One Russian boy let out evil cackles as he fired the gun until Noah repeatedly smacked him in the head with well aimed shots. The boy abandoned his gun, ran across the floor, and began pelting Noah with the balls. However, his throws were not as hard as the gun shots and when he was in the middle of the room, he was an easy target for all of the shooters on both sides.

The next day we joined Gita and Anta at the Latvian Ethnographic Open Air Museum, which is a collection of old Latvian huts, houses, and other structures set in 100 hectares of open wooded land. It was a beautiful day for us to explore the buildings and enjoy some Latvian dancing, music, and food. We headed to dinner at Gita's, where Guntars (Gita's husband) cooked wonderful salmon and other dishes. The kids spent most of the evening playing with Gita and Guntars' new puppy, Dzane (pronounced Jane-uh), in the back yard while we grownups caught up. Rachelle was sweet to do some translating so I could join in the conversation.

On Monday, we met up with Anta and headed to the beach near Ragaciems, north of Riga. Lativa has some beautiful white sandy beaches, and the kids enjoyed making sand/snow angels. Liv and Noah built sandcastles and we had a picnic, having stopped at a local stand where we procured some excellent smoked fish. Later that day, we met up with Toms and Inese at Go Planet, a flashy indoor amusement center where we had dinner and played some high energy laser tag and other games. As Toms is a police officer, he easily outmaneuvered and outshoot us, even though he is a much larger target.

The next day we left our hotel very early and headed to Cesis, where Rachelle's other cousin, Gatis, and his family live. One of the reasons why we decided to go to Latvia when we did (and pull our kids out of school for a week), was to partake in the celebration of Jani, the summer solstace. Latvians get at least 2 days off (our relatives seemed to have 3 days) to return to their pagan roots. Most lativans seem to head off to the country for Jani and they try to stay up all night to ensure good luck for the following year. Gatis works at a sports school and was in charge of organizing a fun run over the holiday. We had signed up for the 6k road race, which had seemed like a good idea several weeks ago. When we got there, there were lots of fit Euros stretching and jogging around. We learned that there is a sports training college in town, and many of the students had shown up for the John's day race. Noah started the race with me, and I repeatedly warned him him to slow down and pace himself, but some things you have to learn the hard way. After a kilometer or so, he gasped that he would wait and run with Rachelle and Liv. I took off and enjoyed passing runners for the rest of the race as I had been able to conserve energy with Noah. I ended up 31st overall and 1st in my age group, which was a boost a day before my birthday. I waited in the heat with the growing crowd of sweaty europeans (yes, it was stinky), I was able to snap photos of Liv and Rachelle and later Noah crossing the finish line. We all enjoyed the post-race free food and drink and exploring the adorable quaint town and castle before heading to Gatis' house.

Gatis, his wife Gita (a different Gita), their 17-year-old daughter, Zane, and their 4-year-old daughter, Marta, live on an idylic spot of farm land on a pond. We spent

the rest of the day celebrating John's day by weaving flower and reed head wreathes, eating Latvian food, enjoying the sun, and playing. I had to excuse myself to Skype back to the U.S. to chair a student's thesis defense, which went well despite a spotty internet connection. Once I re-joined the group, I could enjoy Gatis' homeade beer, which he kept in a large metal vessel hung by a rope down a deep hole in the ground. Gatis' stoked up his sauna, where I enjoyed a traditional ritual cleansing session. This involved me laying down, Gatis' throwing water and incense on the hot stones to steam up and vaporize the room, and then whipping me with birch branches and leaves. He also did some swirling of the hot air over my chakras and whipped me some more until he and I were completely exhausted. We would then dash out of the sauna and dive into the cold pond. This process is repeated 3 times until I enter a nirvana-out-of-body-existential state, which is helped along by the Gatis' home brew. The rest of the day and night were consumed by a haze of eating, singing, and playing; everyone except Noah, Liv, Marta, and Inese (who is pregnant) woke to hangovers the next day.

After some strong coffee/syrup, dark Latvian rye, and other food, we all went on a hike in the Gaujas National Park. We waded in the cold Gauja river and enjoyed the view from the top of a hill. We returned to the home for more playing, fishing in the pond, and relaxing and napping in the sun. Everyone learned it was my birthday, and they sang 3 different Latvia birthday songs. I wish I had a recorded the final song, which was a heavily accented version Happy Birthday. We had a great lunch, including the grilled fish we had just caught. As the birthday boy, I enjoyed an especially big fish that Noah had landed. In the afternoon, we reluctantly said farewell to everyone and headed back to Riga.

On our drive, we decided to peak into Sigulda, a lovely village. As the kids slept in the backseat, Rachelle and I cruised the tree-canopied streets. We then noticed signs pointing to an adventure park of some sort (http://www.tarzans.lv/en). As we neared it, Rachelle whispered to me, "Should we go to the ropes course?" and Liv popped out of her sleep and said, "YES!"

The Tarzan ropes course is like your typical ropes adventure course, but on steroids. If this type of course were found in the U.S. it would be limited to adults who are under very tight supervision. In our case, we had some too-cool teens who quickly mentioned that we should make sure to always be attached by our caribiners to the wires and let us have at it. We were proud of Noah who is scared of heights, but managed to make it through the green and blue courses. As I have done ropes courses before, I watched very closely as Rachelle, Liv, and Noah clipped and un-clipped and moved through the obstacles (e.g., rope swings, climbing walls, widely-spaced wooden slatted bridges, zip lines), which swayed in the tops of very tall trees. Noah dropped off and repeated the green and blue course as Liv, Rachelle, and I moved on to red. Liv was disappointed that she was too young for black or super-black and Rachelle had no intention of moving past the red trail. Once I committed to the black and then super-black, I regretted it, but there is really no turning back. With the teen workers no where in sight and no one to instruct me, it was somewhat sketchy and quite scary.

Rachelle, Liv, and I left Noah and his book as we took the chair lift to the top of the hill for the final course, which consists of a series of zip lines and obstacles, with the final zip line being 150 meters. The teen who sat at the beginning of this course took a break from texting on his cell to watch Liv zip off on the first wire. He then told me to go ahead. I couldn't see Liv or the end because of the trees, but I hooked up and began speeding down the wire. As I picked up speed I saw ahead of me Liv suspended on the wire about 10 feet from the tree platform ending zone. Our eyes locked as we realized we were about to collide, and I barely had time to spread my arms and legs to cushion the impact before we slammed into each other. We were more freaked out then hurt, and one of Liv's shoes flew off into the woods down below. We realized that Rachelle would soon be zipping into us, so I managed to reach overhead and pull us along to the platform. Liv and I stayed shaken up, but finished the course, with some new rules (e.g., I went first to catch Liv so she wouldn't bounce off the tree and back into space, we would yell to the person behind that we were off if they couldn't see us). Despite our near-death experience, we had a great time. Rachelle experienced "flow" while sipping down and the views of the surrounding countryside from the lines were stunning.

As if our day at the ropes course wasn't enough, we decided to go to the water park (http://www.akvaparks.lv/en/) the next day. We opted for the all-day pass, which gave us enough time to explore the large facility. There were indoor and outdoor slides of every variety, a wave pool, a spa area (saunas, steam rooms, jacuzzis, massages, warm pool with a bar, etc.), restaurants, and a "river" twisting throughout the park. As I had repeatedly learned on our trip, especially at the ropes course, laws, rules, and safety are much more fluid and flexible in Latvia. So, I was not surprised when I saw some of the high speed and nearly vertical slides manned by cell-phone toting, gum chewing teens. For example, Liv and I went on a slide in which we had to learn the hard way that you should hold your head up to keep it from banging on the way down. Ouch. After 6 hours, we tried every slide, enjoyed relaxing in the spa area, and repeated our favorite slides a dozen times. No doubt all four of us had a blast.

We spent a low-key last day returning our rental car and hanging out with Gita and Anta. All in all, we had a great visit with friends and family in Latvia.