Riga has just celebrated its 810th birthday with concerts, markets, a knights' tournament, a retro car parade, a salsa marathon, a regatta, aerobatic displays, and many other engaging and crowd-pleasing events. It seems the highlight of this year's celebrations was not the customary fireworks - also impressive enough - but the casting of a key to Riga from 52,763 keys previously donated to a chest.
Initially we had hoped to get onto the legendary "Darling", built in 1907 and purchased from ABBA, but no less lovely was a light wooden boat called "Maria" (four in total operate the route). A ticket, or boarding card, cost Ls 6 per person. The boats operate on the canal every day from 9:00 to 23:00, from the beginning of May to the end of October, stopping at the boarding point every 20 minutes.
I have always been fascinated, if not by time travel exactly, then at least by imagining how a particular place looked a century or two ago and how it might look in the future. One day I simply picked up a camera and walked around the city centre to capture several Riga streets, buildings, and squares, and later compare them with past photographs found in the Letonika database. I must say, I discovered many interesting details.
Although yesterday the rather unfriendly fine drizzle prevented us from fully enjoying all the festival events, we did attend several of them, and it was interesting - aerobatic display flights, a puppet procession, a retro car parade, an artisans' market, a show at the Small Guild, an open house day at the Russian Drama Theatre, and of course the fireworks.
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