I had one definite "to do" on my list for Riga: seeing the city from the river via kayak. Thankfully, Mark set up everything for it, since I couldn't find a website that had anything to do with the English language.
I actually really wanted to see it by night (which is supposed to be spectacular with all the lights), but we went on a bit of a movie binge while in Riga, and had tickets to see Ghostbusters on its premier night in Riga. We were hoping for cool movie posters (like we scored on the premiere night of Jason Bourne), but no luck. And you know, when it comes to Ghostbusters or kayaking at night, the Kennedys will always choose the movie.
Anyway, I can't imagine kayaking at night now that I've done the trip, because the last 30 minutes are on the actual river (versus the canal), and it honestly feels more like an ocean because it's so dang big. And the current was crazy strong. And we were told to stay away from the middle of the river because of the big shipping boats that come down it. Yeah, what would we do, I ask you, if they couldn't see us, and we couldn't paddle fast enough?
Anyway, back to the story.
We found the place. This seems obvious, but we've done enough water sports where finding the actual dock where the business works from proves to be difficult. And we were doing it in Latvian.
Turns out, the guy preferred English over Russian. And once again, I took my sweet son down a peg. My son who insists that most people speak Russian over Latvian in Riga. Uh-huh. I think I would be just fine living in Latvia...and speaking LATVIAN.
He gave us our life jackets, and he earned major points with me, not asking me my size...but instead just giving me a life jacket that could have been made for me. I do believe I will have some PTSD in my geriatric years when I think back on the number of times I was asked to announce my size in front of large groups of men...SCUBA diving, kayaking, being on the water in general.
He also gave us kayak "skirts". I've seen these before but never with a waist strap and so large. I would have bet money that you would never have seen John put one of those one, but I guess with all the skirts he wears in the operating room, he's learned to let down his machismo guard. And as he always says (at least to the nurses in the OR), "It's not a skirt. It's a KILT!" Of course, he took it off after five minutes in the water because he was too hot, but I have the moment recorded for posterity so it definitely counts.
The guy then gave us a laminated map and wished us luck. He told us that it would probably be a two hour trip.
I'm not sure what probably meant there. If we weren't carried away by the current, it would probably be two hours. If we had any kind of muscle mass in our arms, it would probably be two hours. If we can actually read the map that is bungee-corded to the front of our kayak, we would probably be back in two hours. I was hoping that he was being optimistic.
We headed straight into the canal, and I must admit that it was great fun seeing all the places from the seat of a kayak that we had visited on foot earlier in the week. The city is just so beautiful.
One surprise along the way that our fearless renter of kayaks didn't know (or didn't choose to tell us) was that there was some kind of competition happening along the canal. I would have taken a picture of the sign announcing the competition because I was proud of the fact that we could figure out what it said....except we were smack dab in the middle of the competition. And we were definitely paddling against everything the competitors were doing.
There were hanging things from strings attached to trees and bridges. I have no idea what those are called, but they're red and white striped and have numbers on them. I believe they're used to demonstrate kayak skills, like quick turns and the like. At first, the competitors looked pretty normal, using kayaks like the ones we were using. However, the further down the canal we got, things took a turn for the crazy. We saw pairs sitting on pontoon-like floats with seats strapped to the pontoons, and they were rowing like they were on dragon boats. And they were yelling and screaming at each other. And I swear there was no one under the age of 60 on those boats. In fact, we weren't completely in control of where our kayaks were going, and at one point, we ended up heading straight into one of these boats. All I can remember is a rage-infused face of one geriatric woman, eyes bulging, spit coming out of her mouth, yelling (I thought) at me. Being in the front of our kayak, I stopped paddling, and very calmly said, "Ummm, excuse me?" I realized that she probably didn't even see me, nor hear my polite English-phrased question, because she obviously had her eyes on the prize as she blasted by us. If ribbons were given out for the desire to win, she definitely took first place! We did everything we could to move past that special little moment in time.
We finally came out to the river itself, and it wasn't just any river. This is a major river with shipping ports along the side which meant big shipping boats. And whereas along the canal, we had kayaked underneath cute little pedestrian bridges, we were now out among the big boys. Bridges like this:
I actually really wanted to see it by night (which is supposed to be spectacular with all the lights), but we went on a bit of a movie binge while in Riga, and had tickets to see Ghostbusters on its premier night in Riga. We were hoping for cool movie posters (like we scored on the premiere night of Jason Bourne), but no luck. And you know, when it comes to Ghostbusters or kayaking at night, the Kennedys will always choose the movie.
Anyway, I can't imagine kayaking at night now that I've done the trip, because the last 30 minutes are on the actual river (versus the canal), and it honestly feels more like an ocean because it's so dang big. And the current was crazy strong. And we were told to stay away from the middle of the river because of the big shipping boats that come down it. Yeah, what would we do, I ask you, if they couldn't see us, and we couldn't paddle fast enough?
Anyway, back to the story.
We found the place. This seems obvious, but we've done enough water sports where finding the actual dock where the business works from proves to be difficult. And we were doing it in Latvian.
Turns out, the guy preferred English over Russian. And once again, I took my sweet son down a peg. My son who insists that most people speak Russian over Latvian in Riga. Uh-huh. I think I would be just fine living in Latvia...and speaking LATVIAN.
He gave us our life jackets, and he earned major points with me, not asking me my size...but instead just giving me a life jacket that could have been made for me. I do believe I will have some PTSD in my geriatric years when I think back on the number of times I was asked to announce my size in front of large groups of men...SCUBA diving, kayaking, being on the water in general.He also gave us kayak "skirts". I've seen these before but never with a waist strap and so large. I would have bet money that you would never have seen John put one of those one, but I guess with all the skirts he wears in the operating room, he's learned to let down his machismo guard. And as he always says (at least to the nurses in the OR), "It's not a skirt. It's a KILT!" Of course, he took it off after five minutes in the water because he was too hot, but I have the moment recorded for posterity so it definitely counts.
The guy then gave us a laminated map and wished us luck. He told us that it would probably be a two hour trip.
I'm not sure what probably meant there. If we weren't carried away by the current, it would probably be two hours. If we had any kind of muscle mass in our arms, it would probably be two hours. If we can actually read the map that is bungee-corded to the front of our kayak, we would probably be back in two hours. I was hoping that he was being optimistic.
We headed straight into the canal, and I must admit that it was great fun seeing all the places from the seat of a kayak that we had visited on foot earlier in the week. The city is just so beautiful.
 |
| There are fountains all along the canal which look beautiful from the parks. Mark and Glo actually headed straight into it just for kicks. |
One surprise along the way that our fearless renter of kayaks didn't know (or didn't choose to tell us) was that there was some kind of competition happening along the canal. I would have taken a picture of the sign announcing the competition because I was proud of the fact that we could figure out what it said....except we were smack dab in the middle of the competition. And we were definitely paddling against everything the competitors were doing.
There were hanging things from strings attached to trees and bridges. I have no idea what those are called, but they're red and white striped and have numbers on them. I believe they're used to demonstrate kayak skills, like quick turns and the like. At first, the competitors looked pretty normal, using kayaks like the ones we were using. However, the further down the canal we got, things took a turn for the crazy. We saw pairs sitting on pontoon-like floats with seats strapped to the pontoons, and they were rowing like they were on dragon boats. And they were yelling and screaming at each other. And I swear there was no one under the age of 60 on those boats. In fact, we weren't completely in control of where our kayaks were going, and at one point, we ended up heading straight into one of these boats. All I can remember is a rage-infused face of one geriatric woman, eyes bulging, spit coming out of her mouth, yelling (I thought) at me. Being in the front of our kayak, I stopped paddling, and very calmly said, "Ummm, excuse me?" I realized that she probably didn't even see me, nor hear my polite English-phrased question, because she obviously had her eyes on the prize as she blasted by us. If ribbons were given out for the desire to win, she definitely took first place! We did everything we could to move past that special little moment in time.
We finally came out to the river itself, and it wasn't just any river. This is a major river with shipping ports along the side which meant big shipping boats. And whereas along the canal, we had kayaked underneath cute little pedestrian bridges, we were now out among the big boys. Bridges like this:
I would like to say that I took this picture, but I was honestly too busy paddling for my life. And try as I might to stay out of the middle of the river (clearly marked on the three bridges we crossed), when we finally stopped to take a picture, where do you think we found ourselves? Yep, we couldn't have been straighter down the middle lane underneath the bridge.
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| I used the excuse that I wanted to take a picture with Riga in the background, but really I just wanted to rest my arms. But don't tell John that :-) |
Well guess what? The trip that should have taken two hours? We finished in an hour and a half...and the guy scolded us for not relaxing more.
In the words of Homer Simpson, "DOH!"
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