In the land of Liven

Day 3 - on the road!🛣

Hello rental car, let's go to the countryside.🚙👍

First stop, east of Riga: Kurort and Seebad Jurmala.🛀👒⛱ Elegant summer villas - the glorious era started in the 19th century. Many are still in the sleeping beauty sleep.🏚

Surrounding nature, 300-year-old pine trees.🌲🌲🌲

Next stop: Cape Kolka National Park. 'Meeting point' of the Baltic Sea and the Bay of Riga, often rough sea with colliding waves.🌊 But today it was very calm. However, more shipwrecks are said to rest at the bottom of the sea here than anywhere else in the Baltic Sea.👾☠🚢

Something similar can be found outside the tiny village of Mazirbe. Ship graveyard in the forest!😎 Not mentioned anywhere in the travel guide, discovered by chance. Read 'Laivu kapseta' on the map and googled it afterwards. 🤓🕵️‍♀️

Mazirbe - according to the travel guide, this is the heart of the Liven people.💚 This small people settled in this area over 3000 years ago - long before the Baltic people. During the Soviet era, Livenland became a restricted area and the inhabitants had to leave their villages.

Today there are only about 1000 Livens along the northwest coast of Latvia.😥 Only about 10 to 20 people still speak their language, Livonian, despite rescue attempts (e.g. university studies).🆘️

Our hotel bed is in Liepaja today. After World War II, Liepaja was cut off from the outside world for 45 years and was closed to foreigners and locals without special permission.⛔🚷 What was so important? Ice-free port all year round, large steelworks.💰💰

So, over 400 km of the Latvian coast explored. Hard-earned! Country road, always straight ahead! Often bumpy! 15 km gravel road! View of the sea: 0.01%! Forest on the left and right next to the road: 90%! 🙈🙈🙈

An occasional car. From time to time a mini village with a handful of houses. The clocks don't just tick slower here, they seem to stand still. That's decelerating!⏰

Tomorrow: Off to Lithuania!🤗