Return to Latvia pt. 9: ferry far away

After having done my second wild camping I thought I would take the ferry to Nidden from the harbour in Minija. Little did I know that what I read about there ferries going 2x each hour only applies to the harbour in Klaipeda. In Minija it is only 2x a day.

Due to still breaking breakfast I missed the first boat.
Then, after finding out there are no ferries running in Vente on monday had to go for the second boat in Minija. I also missed that one. I took a supposedly faster route to Minija but ended up on the wrong side of the water, and there is no bridge.

A meeting with a fellow cyclist on a camping in Ventė sparked the solution. She also had ferry problems and opted to go to Klaipeda as not wanting to wait any longer. I did the same. It just took me about 2 hours or so to cover close to 50 km. Quite the difference with the two days before, where I cycled about 215 km in 2 days (including offroading) but it took up a lot more hours due to adverse weather. I couldn't believe when I got to Klaipeda there was a lot of gravel, being one of the biggest cities in Lithuania.

In Klaipėda I would take it easy and rest for two days, as it seems I needed it. I stayed in a hostel so I could do my laundry. I would have preferred wildcamping again >: Yet, the "Klaipeda hostel" where I stayed comes highly recommended. In Klaipeda there was a lot of rain. With the expected rain in Latvia also I bought a cheap raincoat and extra cycling short at Humanitas, a jogging pants at the market and (dry) shoes at Lidl. A flat tire led me to cancel my 20 km cycle trip in Klaipeda. During these restdays I did still see the Klaipeda university and the launch of an air balloon!

On the day of check out I went to Nida, 3 days later than initially planned. A 50 km cyle after getting across with ferry from Klaipeda. In part I did the ride with two people from the hostel, they helped me to find the right way when I got lost. :)
Then we went sightseeing in Nida together and we could take the bike back on the bus.

Most time I spent in the Curionan Spit on the beach letting my clothes dry. Luckily it was possible as there was close to no rain! where a lot of rain was expected again. Because of the late departure I reached Nida quite late.  In retrospect I would have reached Nida a lot earlier if I would have done another sleepover at the other harbour. But at that time I did not know there were no ferries going directly from Klaipeda to Nida anymore.

In the end, Nida was short and sweet. After the return to Klaipeda I would move on a little bit up north to wild camp for the third time. Knowing that for the next day, with all the delays, I finally could say:

Next up: Latvia here we come!!