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Published: December 1st 2009
Five on top of each other
At the top a chicken standing on a cat, standing on a pig standing on a cow standing on us.One weekend in Riga
We have two more small trips we would like to write about. Like the trips to Berlin and Milan they are too small to merit one entry each but together they are enough for us to write about.
First we would like to write about our trip in Riga.
In Riga we stayed at a youth hostel called
Tiger Hostel. The name of the hostel is not as strange as you might think. You see the owner of the hostel is a tiger and there are tiger paintings on the walls and carpets with tigers on them on the floor and so on. It was a very nice hostel and the owner was a very nice fellow too.
In a restaurant in Riga dad got all excited when he saw that they were selling a bottled water named
Borjomi. He said that this water has been shipped all the way from Georgia in Caucasus and that it is one of the best bottled waters in all of Eastern Europe. After having tasted it we don’t want to try any other bottled water in Eastern Europe. If this is the best water Eastern Europe has
Tiger Hostel
The owner of the hostel is a tiger to offer the World the second best water is probably undrinkable, the third best will make you puke before you manage to fill up your glass and the ones that don’t reach top three are likely to more resemble toxic waste than Evian. Sorry dad, we didn’t like Borjomi in spite that you say it is supposed to be good.
On the second day in Riga we went to a playground in a nearby town called Jurmala. It was the best place we went to on this trip. We like playgrounds and this one was a particularly good one! We played with swings, climbed a huge Jungle Gym, we walked on a big rope bridge and walked on something that looks like a hybrid between a treadmill and a hamster wheel. It was really good fun. The problem was that we were too light to make it move. But when dad hopped on and started walking with us it moved wonderfully.
In Jurmala we also went to a park where they had several statues put up. Two of the statues were of dragons. Dragons are supposed to be mean and dangerous but not these ones. They looked so
Borjomi
Sorry dad, we didn’t like Borjomi in spite that you say it is supposed to be good. friendly that we didn’t hesitate a second to take photos of them with us sitting on them.
When we came back to Riga we came across a bridge where people have put up padlocks. That reminded us of our mission to put the largest possible padlock
on Ponte Milvio in Rome. Maybe we can come back to Riga too and set up the mother of all padlocks here too? Or maybe we should skip that. The bridge here in Riga looked a little brittle. Maybe the padlock we have in mind is going to make this tiny little bridge collapse.
On a pavement in Riga we saw that they had carved in the name Freddy Mercury on a stone. Freddy was in his time one of the best singers in the World. When we saw his name we promptly stopped walking and started to sing some of the songs he used to sing. We sang “We will rock you”, “I want it all” and “Bohemian Rhapsody” at the top of our voices and danced around until people thought we were crazy.
In Riga we saw something we didn't expect to see - the Eiffel Tower. We have seen the Eiffel Tower
Playground
Huge Jungle Gym before when
we were in Paris. The strange thing is we were in Riga now, not in Paris. So how can the Eiffel Tower be here? This was very confusing for our little heads. You know, we are only little toys and we have no brains. There is just stuffing in our heads so sometimes it is difficult for us to figure things out. But so much we understood this time that the Eiffel Tower is not supposed to be in Riga. It is supposed to be in Paris. When we come to Paris next time we have to check out if the Eiffel Tower is still there. We doubt it because it looks like the Latvians have stolen it.
Well that is pretty much all we did in Riga. Hope you enjoyed reading about it.
A week in Poland
In August we also spent a week in Poland. We didn’t do very much there on this week because mum and dad “were not up to travelling this time”. Lazy people is what they are! They bring us on a trip and then they don’t take us on any sightseeing. It’s like giving someone a cake
Treadmill and hamster wheel in one
The problem was that we were too light to make it move and then lock it in a safe and say “Sorry, you can’t eat it!”. We felt so cheated on this trip. We tried to make them take us to all kind of places. We took the guidebook and suggested that we could go to Krakow, we could go to Berlin (it is closer than you think) or that we could go to Warsaw. But nothing we tried worked on mum and dad. They just looked at us and said “This trip we are just going to stay here in Kolobrzeg and take it easy. We are going to stay here and spend time with your cousins, your grandparents and your aunts and your uncle who all have come here with us.” “Or they can come with us to Krakow and Warsaw we tried” but to no avail.
The second day when we were in Kolobrzeg we were so bored that we didn’t know what to do. We were climbing the walls when mum came down to us and gave us some horrifying news - we were all scheduled to go down to the beach together. And we thought it couldn’t get any worse…
Kolobrzeg is a terribly boring
Treadmill and hamster wheel in one
But when dad hopped on and started walking with us it moved wonderfully. place unless you are very fond of sitting on the beach and get sand in your hair, in your fur, in your ears and in your pants. We like neither of those so we didn’t like Kolobrzeg. Well in the city centre it wasn’t quite as bad as it was in suburb, or as we called it “the desert”, where we stayed. There were a few nice cafés, we saw a fountain we liked and we also saw a group of statues called the Tree Huggers. The tree huggers were nice. They stood in line next to a tree and took turns in hugging the tree.
So a few moments of happiness we had on this trip to Poland but for the most part it was just dreadfully boring.
The journey from Poland to Sweden didn't exactly make us any more cheerful - mum and dad had booked us on a ferry. We thought we were going to go by plane. We were even hoping that we could travel in luxury now that it seems like dad know some kind of trick that can get himself and us
into business class in airplanes.
When we walked around the ferry we started
Bridge
Jungle Gym cum bridge to worry that maybe this floating vessel isn’t safe to travel with. Everywhere they had set up lifejackets, lifeboats and lifebuoys. Mum and dad said that the ferry is just as safe as any boat we have ever been on before and that all the safety equipment was just precautions. So the lifejackets, lifeboats and lifebuoys were just put there and not be meant to be used? They sure weren’t there for aesthetics because they were really ugly. To be on the safe side we made sure to memorise the way to the lifeboat. We had preferred to stay
in the lifeboat all through the trip but that was not allowed. But the ferry didn’t sink so perhaps we had no reason to be worried in the first place.
On the lifebuoy we saw on the boat from Poland to Sweden the word "Nassau" was written. After we came ashore, very happy to still be alive, we started thinking about what that might mean. We looked on the Internet and quickly found out that
Nassau is a city in
the Bahamas. The Bahamas is in
the West Indies. Walter the Walrus, who
we met in Tromso this summer, talked a lot about the West Indies.
Dragon
Dragons are supposed to be mean and dangerous but not this one. Maybe we can persuade mum and dad to take us to Bahamas next year. If Walter is right it should be a nice place.
Well this trip to Poland was a big waste of time. We hope the next trip we go on is better.
Greetings,
Emma and Jean-Claude
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Tack Åke
Tack Åke som vanligt för bilder och berättelser. Jag och min Lena har lite fuderinar på att åka till Riga en sväng efter nyår. Vi får se om vi hinner med och om detkan bli av. Svante