A little bit of history

Riga Hostel was phisically born during May 2005 but the idea came long time before.
On summer 2004, 3 latvian girls (Gunta, Kristine and Inga) decided to spend their holiday in a
workcamp in Serbia. In that travel and during the stay in a Budapest hostel, Kristine, a chaotic girl with many ideas, view the posibility of make something like this in their own city: Riga. On the same time, Gunta, a vocational busniess woman, saw the realistic part of the idea, that part which Kristine couldn't see, and with the union of this 2 minds the firsts steps for Riga Hostel were already done.
Some days later, in Serbia, in the small city of Sremski Karlovci, one spanish guy was arriving to what was going to be his third
workcamp, there he was going to meet many people and many good friends for the rest of his life, but more important than this, he met a latvian girl, Kristine, who was going to be responsible of giving a wild turn to his life.
Some months later, after a very good experience in Serbia, Juan went to visit Kristine for two weeks in Riga. Those two weeks became three months that saw the first search for hostel places in Riga and the opening of the first version of
Riga Hostel web page (October 31st), when there was still nothing to publish, but anyway we were very happy of having a web page.
After Christmas, the Riga Hostel company, was oficially registered and on february we found what seemed to be the right place for the hostel. After long conversations with the owner, two months later, we signed a first contract that for us was like getting the hostel, but that was not true. Two weeks later the we lose all our hope when the second owner of the house didn't accept the idea of making a hostel, his idea was to have one embassy or something with more level than a group of young and cheap travelers. (4 months later, we saw how this place became a hostel just 50 m. away from our).

After this moment of confussion we started our research again, the work was not difficult, in Riga old town there were many places to rent which could be good hostel locations but, the problem was with the owners. After more or less 30 calls, almost nobody gave positive answers and the people who showed interest resulted to be not very trustful or simply stupid.

Finally, one misterious call from one agent, gave us a place where everything was ok. The house was located inside old town, completly new inside and outside and space enaugh for a lot of beds and diferent confirgurations for rooms. But it was not perfect, it had a vertical estructure, which made the hostel less lively, small place for common room and a lot of stairs to climb, but was already may and we couldn't wait more. So finally, when owner said yes, we were more than happy.

Now was the moment to work.
We needed to finish some things in the hostel and of course buy beds, many beds. There were some showers left, there was no kitchen and one room was completly empty. With the support of
Dzintras Cirules Arhitektu Birojs, we started the hard works in kitchen, toilets and showers. On the same time we found the money to pay a big part of the total spenses. Also we bought many things until complete everything to make one empty house a good and nice place to live. We were lucky to have one of the room ready to use, with bed included, which let us give a good welcome to our first guest on 19th May. Christiano, a brazilian guy who was living in Barcelona and travelling across europe. He stayed 3 nights with us and payed our first Lats. The good feeling of the moment after being thinking about this during months and after all the problems we left behind, make us the most happy people in Riga.
During the next days we were finishing rooms and setting up the hostel in may internet bookings sites, which sent us the first bookings for the summer and following weeks. Everything was going perfect.
Of course, we also had problems, with the work, with the money and with the place. We discovered things which we didn't think before. Like our neighbours, Foxy lounge and Pupu lounge, one not very nice and second not very quiet. This gave us a little bit of disapointment, but it disapear along with the people who was arriving.

Then, June 1st, was the day of the oficial opening, all rooms were more or less finished, all the 62 beds were made, the kitchen was ready, all the bathrooms, matresses, pilows and blankets, glasses, plates, forks, knifes and spoons, chairs, tables, internet and telephone, tv, books, guides, maps, free coffee and tea, workers and loads of ilusion and energy.

To be continued...