Estonian & Lativan adventures

I arrived in Latvia at Riga airport late at night by myself, navigated my way to a hostel and awaited the arrival of Julian and Jana the next day. We hired a huge 9-seater van and made a bee-line straight for Estonia. We picked up a vocal Latvian hitch-hiker on the way.

The purpose of my trip was the World Rogaine Championships (http://8wrc2008.rogain.ee/) in Karula National Park, southern Estonian. For the uninitiated, this involved 24 hours of running/walking/navigating in a team of two (I was in a German team with Jana) to visit as many points as possible spread widely through Estonian bog across a 1:40,000 map. There were heaps of tracks, which mean the course was long trudges followed by brief and terrifying dives into the forest/bog to collect controls.

Jana and I were very pleased with our 70km mission throughout the 24 hours over what was for us pretty unusual conditions. Julian & Em went much further, but were still thoroughly beaten by many Eastern European teams that just seemed to excel in the terrain. Even Chris & Dennis struggled and came 2nd instead of retaining the title.

Following on from the rogaine Julian, Jana, Chris, Em and me had 10 days to explore Estonia and Latvia before I was due back in Riga. We hadn't quite predicted that it would never get above 10 degrees so we'd planned to camp, which we did for the first 5 nights before wimping out and staying in hostels or cabins from then on.

In terms of adventures, we had plenty, including my first attempt at mountain biking with clipless peddles, rowing around a lake, getting lost in Estonian bog (on a tourist track) and bush-bashing for an hour to find a road that was still 3km from our car, exploring Tartu, Tallin & Riga, going to a KGB museum, drinking Riga Balsam (the local poison) and summer bobsledding on a real bobsled track.

Above: our luxious cabin and enormous van

Right: boardwalk Estonian style

Right: Jana with a friendly local kitten

Below: Julian and Jana about to be pulled back up the hill in the bobsled Julian and I mountain biking

I was pleasantly surprised to find Estonia & Latvia are incredible modern and friendly countries. There was cellphone reception everywhere and free Wifi was available in the most obscure places. Things are still pretty cheap too - get in while it lasts!