Valka and Valga, These Twins Love the EU

Zagan the motorhome is, ah, in a hospital car park in Rõngu, Estonia. Nah, don’t worry, we’re all fine, we spotted the parking area from the road and have winged it in here (N58.13981, E26.24586). Only one car here, facing an orchard and fields, nothing to say we can’t stay and no-one around on a sunny-rainy-cloudy Sunday afternoon. Feels good to be here. We’ve given something back by shopping at the co-op next door, buying an Internet SIM (50GB for €6 for 30 days – edit – the leaflet with the SIM was a year old and now only 15GB is included, way more than we need) and finally, on our 3rd attempt, managed to buy some milk.

This morning we woke up here in Valmiera, Latvia:

Free camping spot in Valmiera, Latvia

Not bad eh? Glen and Steve were parked alongside us in the sandy parking area, and reported a van had arrived in the night. I dare say none of the four of us are steel-balled wild-camping experts, and plans had been made to leg it if needs be. Van man was as innocuous as us though, and was gone before we woke up. After a couple of fascinating nights listening to snippets from two decades of their travel stories, we waved goodbye this morning, with us feeling more confident our budget can work, and full of new ideas for the future.

Breakfasted (Crunchy Nut Cornflakes – not managed to get into eating oily fish first thing yet), we rolled on out onto the A3 and turned north. Shortly the A3 shrugged off its coat of the black ‘mac, and left us bumping and bouncing along for several miles. The cutlery shivered and clattered in protest and once again our milk turned to cheese.

Oi, Latvia, Noooooooooo!

There ain’t much between Valmiera and the Estonian border. Pines. Mainly pines. The odd house, a field maybe, then a billion more pines, their lower regions a muted, branchless red as they hoofed off upwards to the skies. Eventually the pines gave out to a town, Valka. Half way into the town a border post pops up alongside an Estonia sign, and we’re in Valga, Estonia. Yep – these two towns were once one and the same place, and like a handful of other towns and cities across the world, are split by and international border.

There’s a wonderful explanation of the whole thing here, but I’ll very quickly summarise in case you can’t be bother to read it:

• Roughly 100 years ago the soviets (trade union leaders to you and I) overthrew the Russian royal family
• This in turn threw the Russian empire, which included Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, into turmoil
• The Estonian’s used the chaos to declare independence, as did the other two
• Much fighting takes place, and eventually the Baltics are declared independent
• The new border between Estonia and Latvia is drawn up: if there are more Estonians than Latvians in a town, then the border goes south of the town and vice versa
• All good, until they got to the town of Walk, which had no majority. No-one wanted to give the town up, and tensions rose
• An English fella was sent in to work out a solution, which he did, by drawing a border which ran through the town
• Which was a bit of problem for the residents – they now needed a passport to walk from one end of town to the other, not to mention a different currency in the shops there
• The Soviets effectively re-united the town in WW2 after fighting the Germans off, again single currency and even a single language (Russian, whether you liked it or not)
• In the early 1990s the USSR fell apart, and boom, the border’s back. Passports out, phrase books at the ready, off down the currency exchange to shop at the co-op
• Other daft stuff happened: the Latvian fire brigade couldn’t attend a fire a few meters away, and folks took 30 mile journeys to hospital when there was a bed a couple of minutes away
• So that’s why Valka and Valga love the EU. It removed the border (Schengen) and it gave both sides the same currency (the Euro)
• They still speak two completely different languages on either side of the border mind, and only co-operation between the two mayors is helping resolve some of the other quirks the towns have to live with

Photos of the border below:

Left leg in Latvia, right in Estonia – Charlie is undecided

This is one town which loves the Schengen Agreement – this used to be a customs post, in the centre of town

Estonia EU sign next to a building flying the Latvian flag

Little black and white posts stand across the countryside and through town demarking the border

Building on left: Latvia. Building on right, Estonia

One of the border crossings which once divided the town

Much of the border through town follows the route of this tiny stream

A lady crossing the border on foot. No customs, no passport, no queues

The split nature of the town attracted me to it, but being honest, we didn’t really warm to the place. A festival was taking place, and we stood with the crowd watching folks in a fun boat race along the river. At least we thought it was fun, especially the chap with the engine which conked out every few minutes. Such a cock-up would have raised roars of laughter and jeers back home. Here, the crowd stood like they’d been sentenced to something nasty. Word is Estonians are the most reserved of the Baltic folks, and on cursory inspection, the word seems to be bang on.

The Pedeli Boat Rally gets underway. Even Mickey failed to get a laugh from the polite crowd. It was lashing it down mind?

No amount of cool sunglasses could save this fella when he had to get a tow. No-one laughed. Except us. Going to need to be careful in the country we don’t offend everyone we meet…

Right to the Sports Hall, Left to Latvia

Valga was looking a wee bit tired

Rail lines in Valga

About a third of the newspapers were in Russian. Signs are in Russian. No-one in the shops seems to speak any English

Symbol of unity in a divided town

Roof ladders are expensive. Why not just make your own?

Street scene in Valga, Estonia

Zagan failing to buy milk in Valga

They sell milk (Piim) in bags here, but also some almost-off yogurt stuff (Keefir & Pett). Between us we’ve picked up the wrong stuff twice now.

Dog food with dried vegetables

Beer! You can get pints here?

Whooa. Intermission there. A HUGE mutant wasp-thing just managed to force his way around the net in the rooflight. Seen him off with a cup.

Right, so, we didn’t much fancy Valga, so headed north to a location we got from park4night.com next to a monument to those killed in the war for independence in the fields at Paju. The donuts look like Zagan did ’em, but he didn’t, honestly. Evidence of the neds, plus plenty smashed glass, had us back on the road in a jiffy.

No donuts done by us, the tyres cost too much!

The Paju monument

Heading for a campsite we spotted this parking area from the road and have slotted ourselves into a quiet corner. The co-op flogged us a SIM (no smiling from anyone during this transaction), and we’ve checked out both houses in the town. It looks like a great spot for a kip before we shift onwards and upwards tomorrow.

After moaning about the roads I saw this map, showing most of the minor roads in this part of Estonia are still dirt

No LPG in Finland? No problem.

Cheers folks! Jay