Excursion to open Air Ethnographical Museum
Located at a distance of 14 km from the center of Riga on the banks of the picturesque Lake Jugla. The museum was started in 1924 and now it is one of the oldest open air museums in Europe. Old houses, household articles of peasants, fishermen and craftsmen have been brought there from all regions of Latvia. There is even an inn, a mill and several churches. In the exhibition hall you can find exhibitions of applied art. The museum has 107 buildings on its territory all in all (about 100 ha).
Tour to Rundale Palace
Rundale Palace, the most magnificent masterpiece of baroque architecture in the Baltic States, lies at a distance of 70 km from Riga. It was built in the first part of the 18th century by the Italian architect F. B. Rastrelli, the baroque genius from Italy who created many of St. Petersburg`s finest buildings including the Winter Palace. The professionally renovated palace interiors are decorated with authentic 18th cent. furniture, paintings and china. The most impressive are the Golden Hall, the White Hall, and the bedroom of the Duke of Courland Johan Ernst Biron. The palace boasts a beautiful French-style park.
Excursion to Siguida and Turaida
Sigulda, often called the Latvian Switzerland, is located about 50 km from Riga in the Gauja River valley. Sigulda is situated in the Gauja National Park and is known as the most popular tourist and leisure destination as well as a famous winter sports resort in Latvia because of its bob-sleigh track and the down-hill skiing routes. Experience a genuine whiff of the Middle Ages, a time of romantic legends, castles and heroic figures, visiting the ruins of the 13th cent. Crusader Castle and the 19th cent. Kropotkin‟s Palace in the outskirts of Sigulda. By coach you will travel down into the river valley, enjoy the landscape and the walk to the sandstone grottoes on the ancient river bank.
Tallinn City tour by foot (3 hours)
City tour of Tallinn, a picturesque old city, where whole districts date back to the middle Ages. You will visit the Old Town with its quaint narrow streets and beautiful merchants` houses exemplifying the best of Gothic architecture. The tour includes Toompea Castle, the 13th century Dome church, the 19th century Russian orthodox Cathedral of Alexander Nevskij, the 15th century town Hall square, the Old Guild built to celebrate Tallinn`s membership in the Hanseatic League, and St. Olaf`s church.
Excursion to Kadriorg Palace (2 hours)
The palace, constructed as a gift by Peter the Great to his wife Catherine I in the 1720s, is an excellent example of Baroque architecture. The Foreign Art Museum of the Kadriorg Palace displays paintings, sculptures, graphic art and applied art of Western Europe and the Russia from the 16 -20 century.
Riga City by foot (3 hours)
During the walking part of the tour you will enjoy the beauty of the ancient hanseatic city, while strolling through the cobble-stone, picturesque streets of the Old Town. In Old Riga you will see the Dome Cathedral, the Church of St. Peter, the old Guild Houses, the Swedish Gate, the architectural ensemble Three Brothers, St. Jacob‟s Church, the Parliament House, Old Riga Castle, and view the many wonderfully restored buildings, now housing cozy restaurants, cafes, bars and souvenir shops.
Tour to central Market by foot ( 2 hours )
Riga Central Market is situated in the heart of Riga, a few hundred meters from Old Town on the banks of the River Daugava, next to Riga International Bus Terminal and Central Railway Station. It is not only one of the largest marketplaces in Eastern Europe in area, but also one of the most visited, as 80,000-100,000 people shop there per day on the average. Architecturally-imposing food pavilions, built in the 1920s, are Riga Central Market‟s calling card. Originally used as military airship hangars, they were later transformed into market venues. Riga Central Market is unique not only with its pavilions but also with its old warehouses or the so-called spikeri (from German Sp icher), which have now been turned into a hip arts&entertainment quarter.
Vilnius City Tour by foot (3 hours)
During sightseeing in Vilnius tourists visits Old town of Vilnius (St. Anna`s Church, ST. Peter`s and Paul`s Church, the Cathedral, University, Gates of Dawn). The Old Town, which is included to the UNESCO World Heritage List, looks like a maze of small streets. In the centre of the Old Town stands the Cathedral with a bell tower. It occupies the site of an ancient pagan temple to the God Perkunas and originally lay within the fortification system of the Lower Castle. In the narrow old streets one will see numerous pieces of historical heritage, like St. Anna`s Church - a gem of Gothic architecture, University building, as well as the ruins of the Upper and Lower Castle.
Excursion to Trakai Castle on the lake (4 hours)
Tour of Trakai, the former capital of Lithuania, which is situated on an island in the middle of a lake. The 14th century red brick castle now houses the Art Museum. The castles of Trakai are the best known works of defensive architecture in Lithuania. The old town of Trakai, which includes the Island and the Peninsula Castles, surrounded by lakes, is one of the most impressive and most picturesque locations in Europe. Here still reside small national minority of Karaites, who were brought from the Crimea by the Grand Lithuanian Duke Vytautas.
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