A boat ride to Jurmala

This barge and tugboat reminded me of Port Kelly on the Columbia River. Just outside of Riga there were multiple cranes moving coal to railroad cars and to barges.

This is the Gublers in the forefront, with the sailboat between them.

This morning we joined the Gublers on a boat ride to Jurmala. It's a 2 1/2 hour ride and the weather was perfect. So perfect in fact, that I have a sunburn. Of course, we were on the water, and I haven't been working out in the yard as I normally would have been doing.

Jurmala is a tourist town and you may remember the name from a blog of a few months ago, when as a missionary zone we went to the beach at Jurmala on a very, very, cold day and there was snow on the beach. There was no snow today. The sand is the finest I've ever seen and very light-colored. However, the water is another thing. It's very dirty--no white breakers here. There were a lot of people on the beach, including in swim suits, but when we walked down on the boardwalk, it was so windy and cool that we stayed just long enough to snap the pictures.

On the boat we met a couple from Norway who said it was cheaper for them to fly to Riga and have dental work done here, than to have it done in Norway. They were a friendly couple and, on the way back to Riga, the woman approached Sister Gubler and ended up giving her name and phone number to have the missionaries

On the way to Jurmala, I met a very nice couple from Sweden who were in Riga for a long weekend. They met in Luxembourg when he was working there. Sweden is just an hour's flight from Riga. We had a very enjoyable visit. They asked how long I was here and then, how often I returned home. They were very surprised to learn we come for 18 months and don't go home in between. I told them that e-mail helps me keep in touch with my family and friends.

The woman works for the European Union (EU) Center for Disease Control (CDC) and I asked her about the swine flu in Europe. She said there are only 5 countries it has not come to, yet, but that it is just a strain of influenza and if you are healthy, it's not a serious thing. That was good to know.

I'll post some pictures here (or wherever they land) that I took as we traveled to Jurmala. We saw sail boats, motor boats, boats like Lance & Julie have (can't think what to call them), large rafts, canoes, etc., and swans.