Wednesday night. I’ve actually arrived and already I feel different. I feel as if I am beginning to settle. All the internal jumble is finding a home. I’ve had quite a day. I think I want to get down a few absolutely first impressions.

The river is huge.

Some of the buildings looked fascinating as I drove through in the dark.

I drove through Riga in the dark on the wrong side of the road.

The car hire man was very helpful, despite my best efforts. Bus. No bus. Walk. Phone call. Bus. Car.

The car is smaller than I thought it would be. The car will be fine.

This hotel is really strange. The walls are yellow in my room. It feels more like a school than a hotel. I arrived after midnight. The girl at the desk was helpful. The staircase is very wide. The room is large and has twin beds. I am writing at a pine desk. All the furniture is pine. There is a small fridge under the table, not plugged in. The ceiling is quite high. The curtains are yellow, with pencilled on designs of flowers, little circles, some things I initially thought were rudimentary shell fish, but may be leaves; brown lines that could be cakes, and scribbled circles. That’s the curtains, oh, very faded on the left end. There’s a TV on top of the wardrobe and one small picture of a snow scene with a pond and a church on the wall above my bed. And that’s about it. One very tiny bedside lamp, and, in the drawer of this little table, bibles in Latvian and English.

The bed is weird and the pattern on the bed spread is an advanced version of the curtains. Or maybe the bedspread came first and the curtains are a primitive copy. I think that must be it. The bed is a divan and it doesn’t have a proper mattress, it’s foam, and not quite big enough for the base. But I will get in soon and sleep like a baby, I have no doubt.

Morning. I didn’t sleep particularly well, but I think that was my fault rather than the bed. I’m too alive to sleep. Not that there were many hours for sleeping – the time difference means that breakfast this morning is between 5.30 and 7.00

I’m not sure how to write this. What am I writing? Is it travel, is it philosophy, is it a way of separating myself from the experience? What is the difference between the experience and writing about the experience?

I’ve eaten breakfast – ham, cheese, eggs, radishes, toast, butter, orange juice, coffee are the items I enjoyed. I declined frankfurters, spam and gherkins. A large man presided wordlessly. The TV ran news reports in English. And now I’m back in the room, which is less yellow in the light of day. The light of day that is the light of most of the night as well. Maybe the yellow is to keep the light shining in those few hours of darkness.

Outside there is distant traffic noise, and closer to sparrows going about their business. I heard rooks earlier. Looking out of the window I see a swifts slashing the sky.

I’m in Riga. The panic over the car hire (another story) which played out yesterday morning as I sat in Tescos car park in Petersfield proved quite unnecessary. The Latvian man at the car hire desk who helped me twice beyond what I might have expected has endeared me to this strange place already.

The adventure has begun.