Blogs from Liepaja, Kurzeme Region, Latvia, Europe

Liepaja west coast of Latvia for Tom's Birthday 1 September 2014 Liepaja is known for its unique former secret military town of Karosta and a magnificent beach. The coastal city is known to Latvians as "the city where the wind is born", for the sea breeze it constantly enjoys. It has a nice beach and a charming town centre with a colourful mixture or architectural styles, from wooden houses and spacious parks to Art Nouveau and concrete, Soviet-era apartment buildings. Some of the drive from Riga to Liepaja was through forest. We noticed a lot of cars had stopped along the road. We found out later they were mushrooming. It is the mushroom season in Latvia. We arrived in the city by late afternoon on 31 August and found a fantastic camp site about 5 kms ... read more

Wanderer It is the emblem (Cout of Arms!) of Liepāja. On one side of the Eschutcheon – a lion. Although it is not heard that in Liepāja or around the town ever lived any lions. However, this does not prevent to put the lion on the emblem. Some other people, towns and states – and even further north – put on their coats of arms even more lions. But some of the coats of arms have even the Moon and Sun on them! On the second half of the emblem is a lime (liepa / Tilia cordiata), from which, presumably, hence the common Latvian name Liepāja (until 1917 Germ. Libau, Russ. Libava). Limes in the city are everywhere, and a pity that there are little convincing, expressive images to display.url=http://www.norsenature.... read more

Before we went to Latvia, I have well prebooked ahead the Behind The Bars night stay at the Karosta Prison in Liepaja, Latvia. Back in the Soviet days, before 1990, it was used to hold political prisoners, they shot more than 150 into death during the Soviet days, and the city of Liepaja was a sealed major military base for the Soviet era. Needless to say the prison is no longer running and became famous scary red brick tourist attraction in the Baltics, but we were quite disappointed that, even thou I was become a prisoner and given a cell to sleep for a night, that night was only two of us staying in this KGB Ghost House, this jail game certainly only for a group thing or school children training but not for a solo ... read more

So we cheated! It appears Baltic train services are quite what they used to be when Mr Stalin and his pals were in charge. Trains aren't what one would call "regular" and quite often although the tracks are there no vehicle ever travels down them. We decided that instead of three 3-4 hour train journeys, a few hours in Vilnius and then an overnight stopover in a place that our guidebook doesn't even mention we would take the two hour bus across the Lithuanian/Latvian border. We cheated but stumbled upon Leipaja. Leipaja is Latvia 3rd City and was once a major naval port for both the germans and the soviets during the WWII. Nowadays it a mixture of crumbling Soviet decay and new sparkling buildings that are being built in the wake of it being dubbed ... read more

Those were some interesting days, I tell you. First of all, I was exploring Vilnius a bit further, especially its cafes, since it was raining for the next two or three days. Apart from that, I visited the Museum of Genocide Victims, also known as the KGB museum. It deals mostly with the KGB in Lithuania, but also pays tribute to the armed resistance against Soviet occupation from 1945-1953. The highlight of the museum was the former KGB prison in the cellar (where else?). A truly chilling place, all the cells were perfectly preserved, including the welcome cell, which was so small that prisoners could only stand inside, and which was used to break the will of the newly arrived, the water cell, where inmates had to stand for hours in freezingly cold water, and the ... read more