Riga! The Europe’s Wifi capital! But of course there is plenty more to see: amazing historic facades, cobblestone roads, a river half a kilometer in width with astonishing views. Fish. Anything to please a traveller, and we haven’t even started on a brand new venue the conference will be in. Do come here. You’ve got plenty of options.
State-owned AirBaltic is your airline of choice: Riga (RIX) is the hub for this relatively low-cost airline. It offers direct flights from most European and Middle-East capitals, including Berlin, London, Brussels, Budapest, Moscow, and Kyiv. Of course you should consult your flight booking website of choice for a possibility of a cheaper flight: e.g. while MOW→RIX with AirBaltic costs 100 €, Aeroflot does the same flight for just 85 €.
Others options of getting to Riga include a ferry from Stockholm, Lux Express buses from nearby countries, daily trains from Moscow, St. Petersburg, and Pskov, driving, or hiring a private yacht. See details on the official tourist website.
If you live nearby, there is a chance somebody from the OSM community will be travelling the same direction, and you could share the costs. Ask around on the telegram group or on other channels.
Continuing the streak from SotM Baltics 2013, we are hosting this conference in a top-ten university in the Baltic States: The University of Latvia. More precisely, in its Academic Centre’s House of Science, which has been opened just a year ago.
The building is new, and some maps might miss it. Use Jelgavas iela 3 for the destination address in your app. Here is a GeoURI and a Maps.Me marker for you. When near, find the Baltic GIT conference banners and follow them.
To get to the Academic Centre, take:
For some reason, it is often cheaper to rent an apartment than a hotel room. On the booking.com website, you’ll see plenty of options starting from 30 € a night (though 50 is a more common price). The best area to rent is around the National Library, which is 15-minute walk to the venue.
To quote the main conference website, the official BGITC Hotel is Wellton Riverside SPA Hotel and most of the guests to Riga will be staying there. When you registered, you should have received a discount code in your email: consider staying there, not in the least because the afterparty will be held in that hotel.
Due to Riga being a popular destination for students and backpackers, there are many cheap hostels, with prices around 10 € a night. Most of these are located in the city centre: the best location criteria for you should be a distance to the nearest tram stop, or to the railway station.
Alas we cannot recommend any specific accomodations, since we haven’t used them much. Please rely on website ratings. If possible, google the name of the chosen hotel or hostel and book directly: that helps them save on huge booking.com fees.
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