When we woke up this morning, we were still sailing to Riga. We weren’t due to reach the port until 11 a.m. The sky was overcast and the forecast was for rain. We started breakfast about 9:30 in the Reflections dining room, opting for a sit-down breakfast instead of the Windjammer buffet.
Due to the length of our ship, we couldn’t dock at the terminal near old town Riga, instead ending up next to a lumber yard in the industrial area, which is a 30-minute drive from town. Royal Caribbean provided free shuttle buses to take everyone into town. We had tickets for bus #18, which dropped us off near the old town about 12:30.
The old town was medical, similar to Tallinn, but not as extensive. We walked around using the Rick Steves guide again, until we decided it was time for a coffee stop. We found a nice outside table at a bar/restaurant on one of the town squares. It was warm, sunny, and somewhat humid, but very pleasant to sit outside. We had a leisurely coffee and decided to get lunch too.
But as we were nearing the end of our lunch, a thunderstorm started with hard rain. The umbrella over us did a fairly good job of keeping us dry, but many other bar customers were out in it. We paid and left during a relative slack period, but it soon started pouring again and we took shelter in a building’s arched portal. After a few minutes of waiting, it let up slightly and we trotted over the wet cobblestone streets toward the bus pickup point. We were lucky there was a Royal Caribbean bus waiting for us there. We were back on board by 4:45.
By the way, we weren’t thrown out of the formal-attired dinner in the dining room last night. We saw there were many others dressed like us. Dinner tonight will again be in the dining room at 8:30, where the expectation is for smart casual clothes. No problem!
Lori's Travels 