Safe Return Doubtful

I have been to the Baltic States before, in August of 1992, almost exactly a year after the three countries had declared independence. I was in my Land Rover Series 2A with four friends who went on to Minsk, St Petersburg, then returned home through Scandinavia. I can recall many of the stories from that course, but only when I’m with at least one the other guys, and we don’t see each other very often to say the least, and sadly, there are only three others now. 

My original plan, or arrival, was to spend about five days in each of the three countries, but the day after leaving Eeva’s hometown, I reduced that. It’s warm and humid here, typical of September, and even flatter than I pictured. With a population of only just over a million it’s easy to get into some real wilderness, but it’s wetlands, forests and bogs, a haven for mosquitoes and tics, which make exploring them less appealing. I’m keen to get back to the mountains. 

Speaking of which, I took in Estonia’s two highest mountains this morning, Suur Munamägi at 317 metres and, four kilometres away, and Vällämägi at 302 metres. 

It isn’t a difficult ascent, about 500 metres up a concrete walkway to the viewing tower at the top, Suur Munamägi translated as the ‘big egg’ mountain. The tower at the top is the fifth one to be built there, this one in 1939, it was damaged in the war, but repaired in 1955. These hills are part of the Baltic Klint, a limestone escarpment at about 200 metres that extends all the way to the Latvian border. 

I was  reminded of..

”When you say “hill,”’ the Queen interrupted, ‘I could show you hills, in comparison with which you’d call that a valley.”

(Lewis Carroll) 

I put together a ten kilometre circuit that took both hills in, but the trails were well walked, though no one was around today, and as yesterday, the mosquitoes fierce. 

Yesterday I stayed about half an hour west of Türi, at a hut, more like a house, on the Baltic Forest trail. This was far more like wild Estonian forest, as the twelve kilometre trail was quite overgrown with many trees down, providing Roja and I with a decent challenge. Though the van stood overnight just off a forest road, it was the first time for a long while when I saw no other vehicle for all the time I was there.

This afternoon I drove on for two hours, west into Latvia and to Rāznas National Park, not far from the town of Rēzekne. I am parked up in the grounds of a Manor House at Lūznava, the grand house and its gardens were bequeathed to the local people in 1946. Today the main building houses a primary school, and also a museum. We took an hour around the gardens when we arrived just after 5 pm, but will explore more tomorrow. 

I am still putting together my schedule for the next couple of weeks, but I will travel more quickly than I had planned and spend the extra week in the mountains. There is a concern about how badly some of the villages and the surrounding roads and land has been damaged from the massive rainstorms they received last week, but I expect I won’t be able to know that until I am actually there.