I cannot tell you how scared I was when we reached Riga three days ago. Since we took the Simple Bus, the Budget line of the Luxe Bus Line, from Tallinn, we were dropped off at the Riga Bus Station right next to the famous five old airplane hangars converted into a Central Market in downtown Riga. The place was bustling with activity but it looked really scary and drab. There were lots of people who looked down on their luck hanging out in the area. Marc and I went straight to the Tourist Information Office inside the Bus Terminal and the young Latvian girl in the booth advised us to be very careful about the Central Market. She even added that we not go through the place on the way to our hotel. The place, she described, was full of pickpockets. Such comment did not help our already unfavorable first impression of the city. Instead of going through the busy Central Market, Marc and I went around it as we searched for the Hanza Hotel, our home in Riga for the two and a half days we were going to be in Latvia. After check in, we felt Riga was more than the Central Market and that it was a beautiful city just as we saw in travel programs and other travelers' blogs. True enough, its Old Town and the city in general changed our minds.

Right outside St. Peter's Church was the monument of the Town Musicians of Bremen. It has become one of Old Town's landmarks. It is basically a sculpture of four animals: a donkey, a dog, a cat, and a rooster standing one on top of another. It is based on the fairy tale by the Brothers Grimm and represents the town musicians of Bremen. It was given to Riga by Bremen, a sister city, last 1990. The original sculpture can be found in Bremen's City Hall.

On our very first afternoon in the city, Marc and I decided to take things easy and not do a cultural blitzkrieg right away. We just walked around the city center leisurely and tried to enjoy every minute we were there.

The House of Blackbeards is a building located in the old town of Riga. The current building is the most recent reconstruction of the original one began in 1995 and completed in 1999.

It was originally erected during the first third of the 14th century for the Brotherhood of Blackbeards, a guild for unmarried German merchants in Riga. Work on the ornamentation were made continually between 1580 and 1886. It was bombed to ruins during the Second World War and its remains were totally demolished by the Soviets in 1948.

This museum was closed and undergoing renovation at the time of our visit. It did move its exhbits to a temporary site which we likewise saw while touring the city. It was around 5 pm when we saw it and was thus closed for the day.

This monument is one I will never forget. It was huge, imposing, and simply grand. When I think of Riga, this comes to my mind above all else.

This was right in the middle of Old Town and looked and felt upscale inside and out. It was modern and very westernized.