Blue Sky Days

The short, dull, biting-cold days of winter are behind us at last. Warmed by the sun, the first pavement cafe opened in the Old Town today and half the city decamped to Mezaparks, Riga's garden suburb. There were long queues for candyfloss and shashlik, people in sunglasses riding bikes across frozen scraps of snow, and children building sandcastles on the park's tiny beach, still wrapped up in hats and gloves. A few hundred metres away the last of the ice fishermen were out, cold and motionless on top of the lake.