A travel vlog by Nate and Kara Buchanan documenting their first day in Riga, Latvia. They take a cheap €2 bus into the city, eat at a pay-by-weight dumpling spot (bowls ~0.4–0.5 kg costing €7 total), visit the Freedom Monument, and take an English tour of the KGB House museum (45-minute tour) that unexpectedly includes a private behind-the-scenes basement and offices showing original KGB-era rooms, interrogation cells, and a Cold War bunker. The hosts strongly recommend the museum and express surprise at Riga’s affordability and attractions.
Questions this video answers
September 14, 2017
€2 per person
€7 total
Kara's ~0.5 kg; Nate's ~0.4 kg
45 minutes
Chapters
Gosh, what an experience. This is amazing that. Ah, it was so good. Now I don't know what we're gonna do, but I'm sure it won't be as good as that.
Today is our first day in Latvia. We're staying about 15 minutes outside of the city of Riga and we're about to try to figure out how to take the local bus into the city center.
Getting a little late.
There's a car. Sorry.
We're starting a little later than we had hoped because we slept right through our alarms this morning and didn't get up until 11. But to be fair, that is 8 Iceland time. So just a little jet lagged off.
To a late start. But we're gonna make the most of the day.
The bus ride into the city was super easy and pretty cheap. Only €2 per person. Now, first things first, we are finding some food because it's too o' clock and we haven't had lunch yet. I've read about this fast food dumpling place in the middle of the city and it's supposed to be really cheap and you just pay by how much your bowl weighs. So that's where we're heading now.
Found the dumplings place. Feeling pretty good about it because nothing is in English and nothing is more than €250. So we walk in, nothing is in English. There's a line of food with bowls. So grabbed a bowl and got pretty much one of everything. And my bowl weighed about a half a kilogram. Nate's was like 0.4. And all this together was only €7, which is just crazy, especially coming from Iceland. So I got some fried cheese dumplings and then every other kind of dumpling you can think of with some sour, creamy looking stuff on top. Salsa looking stuff on top.
Looks pretty good.
You really can't go wrong with fried cheese. But that is so good. All right, I'm gonna try a dumpling. I can't remember what any of them were. I think this might be a veggie one.
That's delicious. I think we found a gym.
I can't say. Oh my gosh. Those are the best dumplings I've ever had. But they were decent, especially with the toppings on top and super cheap. So I definitely recommend that place. It was a great way to start our day and it was really quick. We got a lot to do today.
That is the freedom monument that's under construction. And it was built. What was it built for?
For the soldiers killed in action during the latvian War of 1918-1920.
So there you go. It's one of the top things to see on TripAdvisor.
Can't see it now.
We are heading to the KGB house because one of our viewers highly recommended it to us. To be completely honest, I'm pretty ignor about the kgb. From what I understand, it's like a secret Soviet police force. I think it was a secret Soviet police force. And now this building that we're going to was like their headquarters here in Riga. And they've turned it into a museum. And it sounds super cool and like a really good opportunity to learn something that I know nothing about.
We got the last two tickets for the English tour.
The tour just started for 45 minutes. And there are coffee shops everywhere here. And it's raining. So that's seems like a really good way to kill some fish.
This is huge.
I ordered a giant caramel macchiato for 270.
Now we're going back over to the. Sorry.
What did it take the kgb Now.
Our tour just started.
I think this is going to be awesome. This guy's lived here his whole life. He said he used to go to school. His school was close to the KGB house, but he would take a different road so he didn't have to walk by this place. This is crazy old and spooky. He also told us that people in his generation still won't come here because.
They'Re still scared of it.
This door was a close for KGB guys too. This elevator used only for prisoners.
This was the interrogation room. So it's very creepy in there. All of the furniture in this house is the original KVG furniture. I can't even imagine what's happened at this table.
It's so freaky.
I think it's one I don't know. They would put four people in this tiny room for three days with no food and water. This whole hallway had a red carpet on it because that's the interrogation room and these are the prison cells. So when you drift blood on the way to your cell, they wouldn't have.
To clean it up.
And nobody could see it because it was like a secret. They said that they put potatoes in here because people you.
She smiled.
She said yes. My father helps me.
After 10 minutes, I have a very short live.
Right?
Maybe I.
It.
Did you have some light?
Thank you.
Wow. Thank you so much. That was amazing. Thank you.
What?
This is crazy. Best museum I've ever been in.
So it was the best museum that we had ever been in. And we were standing outside trying to like figure out how we were going to like sum up this experience. Then our tour guide who is shutting down the museum comes out and he's like, do you want to come see some stuff that nobody else gets to see? And we were like, yes, please.
I told you before about this dirty street or mad street.
Uhhuh.
It was right here.
Wow.
Right here. And yep.
You see there's no condensation system.
Yeah.
Here was one more toll. Of course it's not open today.
And he took us like down in.
The basement, the real basement, where no tourists.
None of it's been redone.
Wow.
It was real. Very, very bad. Of course it's not open for tourists. In the middle of 50s, right here was built some nuclear bunker. Because it was a cold war time. So Soviets waited nuclear war for the United States. It's a stupid idea. And here was a build thousand and thousand. So nuclear bunkers in the same building too.
Yeah.
You see this door? Some secret tunnel here.
Secret tunnels?
What?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
It was a build especially for KGB guys. And you see secret tunnel is right here.
Wow.
Just go inside and it's stick it with neighbor's apartment building. That is very, very small.
It's crazy, right?
Because it's Soviet Union. Have some electrical. So right here it's a generator. All is original because you see.
Yeah.
Just number owner's number. And it's renames kg video.
He took us upstairs to the offices.
Maybe 100 years. Nobody come here.
Look at this wall.
Secret spy was right here.
Yeah.
Of course it's empty.
Showed us where like the big boss of the KGB worked. And it's all just empty.
Yeah. So the museum's like a tiny segment of that huge building that was the KGB building.
He was awesome. He had lived in Chicago for a time and apparently was very partial to people from the United States. And was just so nice to take us back in there and show us the stuff. Like I was gonna rave about the museum before we even got the second secret tour. But now like you, you just have to go. If you come to Ria, go to the KGB house. Because it was probably the best museum I've ever been to. I mean it was like horrifying stuff happened, but they just haven't touched anything. Our guide been arrested by the KGB twice. So like he knew he lived it.
He was passionate about Lapia and still loves la. It was so cool to see him get to give us return.
Also this memory card is almost full. We are a 20 minute bus ride away from our place. So we can't get another one. So the rest of the day is going to be very brief. I am so mad at myself. I did not know how great this city would be and I did not book enough time here. It's beautiful, it's cheap, and there seems like a lot of stuff to explore. We didn't get to explore, like, the main central market like I wanted to because it closed.
