The Latvian coast on foot
The Latvian stretch of the Baltic Coastal Hiking Route runs along the beach itself, which means no navigation and no hills at all.
The route.
Day by day.
Daylight is shown for a departure on 3 May, calculated for each day's own location. Ask us and we will run the figures for your dates.
Wooden villas and a first hour on sand
Transfer from Riga out to Jūrmala, the imperial summer capital since 1814. Settle in, walk the length of Jomas iela, and take a first easy hour along the beach to find out what walking on this sand is like.
- Jūrmala's carved wooden villas
- Jomas iela, the pedestrian spine
- A first hour on the sand to calibrate
- Boot and route check with your host
Villa guesthouse, Jūrmala
A restored 1890s villa two streets from the beach, with a drying room and a garden of pines.
Held, not booked, until your deposit clears. If it is gone by then we substitute an equal or better hotel and tell you first.
Out of the resort
Eighteen kilometres west along the beach. The villas thin out after Ķemeri and then stop, and by lunch there is nobody. Fishing boats pulled up on the sand at Ragaciems, and smoked fish sold from a shed.
- The resort gives way to empty beach after Ķemeri
- Grey dunes and pine behind the sand
- Fishing boats drawn up at Ragaciems
- Smoked fish straight from the shed
Fishing village guesthouse, Ragaciems
A wooden house behind the first dune, with a sauna and a terrace facing the water.
Held, not booked, until your deposit clears. If it is gone by then we substitute an equal or better hotel and tell you first.
Lake on one side, sea on the other
Twenty kilometres with Lake Engure a couple of fields inland. It is one of the most important bird lakes in the region, and the route book marks the turn off the beach to the observation tower if you want an hour with the binoculars.
Read the full day
Engure holds something like 186 recorded bird species and a herd of wild horses put there to keep the reed in check. The tower is a twenty-minute detour from the beach and free. In May the noise from the lake carries over the dune.
- Lake Engure and its observation tower
- Wild horses grazing the reed beds
- An unbroken beach for most of the day
- The fishing harbour at Engure
Harbour guesthouse, Engure
By the working harbour, where the boats come in early and you will hear them.
Held, not booked, until your deposit clears. If it is gone by then we substitute an equal or better hotel and tell you first.
The quiet middle
Twenty-two kilometres and the emptiest day of the walk. Small villages set back from the shore, long stretches of nothing, and the occasional rusted Soviet border post half buried in the dune.
Read the full day
This whole coast was a closed military zone until 1991. Nobody was allowed on the beach, which is precisely why there is so little on it now and why the forest behind comes right down to the sand. The concrete posts every few kilometres were watchtowers.
- The emptiest stretch of the whole route
- Soviet border posts in the dunes
- Forest growing down to the sand
- Roja's harbour and its fish factory
Seaside hotel, Roja
A small hotel on the shore road with a sauna, which by this point in the week is the feature that matters.
Held, not booked, until your deposit clears. If it is gone by then we substitute an equal or better hotel and tell you first.
Into Livonian country
The last long day, twenty-five kilometres north through the Livonian villages of Sīkrags, Mazirbe and Košrags, into the Slītere national park. Kolka by late afternoon, with the cape saved for the morning.
Read the full day
Twelve villages along this stretch are the historic Livonian coast. The last native speaker of Livonian died in 2013, though the language is taught again now and the village signs carry both names. Mazirbe has the Livonian People's House, built in 1939 with Finnish and Estonian money, which is usually open and almost always empty.
- The Livonian villages and their double signs
- The Livonian People's House at Mazirbe
- The boat cemetery in the dunes
- Into Slītere national park
Guesthouse, Kolka
A few minutes from the point, so you can walk out to it at sunset and again before breakfast.
Held, not booked, until your deposit clears. If it is gone by then we substitute an equal or better hotel and tell you first.
Where the two seas meet
A last six kilometres out to the point and back. The open Baltic runs into the Gulf of Riga off the cape and on any wind you can see the two swells collide. Transfer back to Riga in the early afternoon, about three hours.
- Cape Kolka, where two seas visibly meet
- The sunken forest of stumps offshore
- The Slītere lighthouse in the pines
- Transfer back to Riga
Request your quote.
Tell us your dates and party size. We'll reply within one working day, with a private, fully-costed version of The Latvian coast on foot to follow within two.
within two working days
Prices shown in USD for reference. You're billed in EUR.
- Private trip: just your party, your pace
- Flexible dates, year-round departures
- No payment taken to enquire
- A $281 pp deposit holds your dates
- Protected under the EU Package Travel Directive
Priced by party size.
- Per person
- $1,275(≈ €1,090)
- Total for 2
- $2,551(≈ €2,180)
- Deposit to book
- $562(≈ €480)
- Balance, 21 days out
- $1,989(≈ €1,700)
Calculated from the same per-person rates as the table below. Final pricing is confirmed with your quote and moves with your dates, room choices and any day you change. Billed in EUR.
Per-person rates by party size
Prices shown in USD for reference. You're billed in EUR.
What's included.
- 5 nights in seaside guesthouses and small hotels (twin or double)
- Luggage moved door to door every walking day
- Route book, waymark notes, offline maps and GPS tracks
- Return transfer Riga to Jūrmala and Cape Kolka to Riga
- Slītere National Park entry
- Daily breakfast and three packed lunches
- A local support number, 08:00 to 21:00, seven days
- International flights
- Dinners and two lunches
- Travel insurance (mandatory; we can recommend providers)
- Personal spending
- Walking poles and boots
