As my vacation neared an end, I took a short 40 minute flight down the coast from Tallinn to Riga, Latvia.

The idea for this trip actually stemmed from Riga. My brother’s friend (my friend too, I guess) is in a band and when I saw him at Christmas, he mentioned that they’d be playing at a festival outside of Riga in the summer. That’s when I started doing some research and decided to make a little trip out of it. I also invited my friend Josie, who lives in Berlin, to join me.

Josie and I met at the Riga airport, checked into our Airbnb, and hit the streets.

Josie and I share a passion for cooking, good food, eating, picnicking and basically anything that has to do with food. Our first stop was Riga’s Central Market Hall, where we got some hunks of cheese, bread, cherries and joined the wrinkled old Latvian grandmas on a concrete stoop to enjoy our feast.

While the fresh fruit and veggies from Poland were really cheap, there wasn’t much else that was super special. We had to laugh at the market; a lot of the vendors were selling packaged cookies that they had removed from their packages and to put into baskets.

We met up with Mike later that night; his hotel was on the same street as our place, so we went to a couple of bars, celebrated his 30th birthday and stayed out till the sun came up. Finally, a lively night on the trip!

Just the 3 of us.