An afforested island in the Gulf of Finland, approximately 14 km to the North of Tallinn.  There is a network of small roads and trails on the island.  Forests:  Mostly 1.1, 1.2 and 4.2.  Information:  www.aegna.ee.  A ferry boat to the island departs from the port at Pirita. 

Hike around the shore of the island, where you will find all kinds of environments – dunes, sandy areas, rocky areas and places with lots of reeds (~9 km).

The restaurant is in the Park Hotel Latgola with a broad view of the city from the 10th floor.  It offers Lettigalian and global cuisine.
Latvian cuisine: Baltic herring salad, caraway cheese salad, Lettigalian snacks with bacon, potatoes, cheese and pickles, pork ribs with sauerkraut, potato pancakes and dumplings, potted peas, sausages, cottage cheese cakes.
Special foods: Cabbage soup with wild mushrooms.

This estate is an unexpected surprise in this place and date.  Work on the castle began in themed-18th century, and it was rebuilt one century later.  During the first half of the 20th century the castle hosted an elementary school, and during the Soviet occupation it was an apartment building.  Today the castle has been reborn in terms of form and content in the direct and indirect sense.  The Mountain Holiness Community works here.  During the summer, there are children's camps and other events.  The old stairs, window shutters and brass door hinges are all original.  A church is being built on the site.  The Renaissance-style garden can be visited.  Contact the estate in advance for a tour of the interior of the castle an church in the company of local residents who will tell you all about the history of the estate and its garden.  300 m to the south-west of the estate is the Brukna Castle Hill, which is hard to see in situ and even harder to access. 

This, the third church at this location, was built in 1906 at the initiative of and financing from Gotthard von Budberg, who dedicated it to his late wife, Gertrude. The Walker company organ in the church was built in 1906 in Ludwigsburg in Southern Germany. In 1992, a memorial plaque to commemorate people from Gārsene who were repressed by the Soviet regime was consecrated at the church. 100 m to the East is a cemetery where we see the legendary chapel of the Budberg dynasty, as well as the graves of the noblemen. The church is open to visitors.

Pilsrundālē pa ceļam uz Rundāles pili var apmeklēt Retro auto kolekciju, kur apskatāmi 1939. g. automobiļi un dažādu laiku motocikli. Starp automobiļiem ir arī pasaulē šodien reti sastopami modeļi. Šī ir īstā vieta vēsturisko spēkratu cienītājiem!

The saloon is on the edge of the Rīga-Daugavpils road (A6), works with local fishermen, and grows herbs and greens in its own garden.

Latvian cuisine: Cold soup, sorrel soup, chanterelle, soup, potato pancakes, filet of Daugava catfish, bream or pike-perch.

Meklējamas Lizuma ciema dienviddaļā. Tās ir vienas no retajām vējdzirnavām (1880. g.), kas saglabājušās labā stāvoklī. Mūsdienās dzirnavas ir gleznotājas Ilonas Brektes īpašums.

One of the highest dunes in Latvia, located between Bernāti and Jūrmalciems villages. It is 37m high and offers a magnificent view of the sea and natural pine forests. The highest dunes in Latvia stand to the South of Jūrmalciems village: the Pūsēnu hill, the Ķupu hill, the Mietragkalns or Tiesas hill, the Pāļu hill, the Garais hill, the Ātrais hill, the Lāvas hill. The Pūsēnu dune is the highest of these dunes which are all called hills by the local people. The Pūsēnu hill developed between 1785 to 1835 when shifting sand became extremely dangerous. Several homesteads were buried in sand, among them „Pūsēni”, where a forester’s family lived. The family is said to have moved to Bārta. The dune was named after the buried homestead.

Jēkabs Janševskis, a Latvian writer, wrote in his book „Nīca”: “In olden times, large pine trees were growing in the dunes on the coast of Nīca and they stood steady and firm. But i Swedish times (around 1650), the Swedes built a large kiln for charcoal and tar. Pine wood and stumps provided an excellent material for this. Once a big fire rose, and the charcoal kiln burned down as well as the whole pine forest. The remaining stumps and bare trunks in the vast burnout could not hold the storm-driven sand; it flew further and further burying not only the burned-out forest, but also the nearest fields. In wintertime, when the vast, low marshy grasslands were covered with ice, jets of sand drifted further over its surface, and soon most of the grasslands and large meadows turned into sandy heath-land and dunes.”

To reconstruct Liepāja, severely damaged during WWII, a silicate brick factory was built in the town. The main raw material was white sand and it was taken from the Bernātu forest. In the 1960-ies they started to dig off the Green Dune and the White Dune, later also the Pūsēnu hill. The excavators used to work day and night, in three shifts. The work stopped at around 1980, as there was no more sand suitable for production of brick.

A trail is set up to facilitate walking in the Pūsēnu Dune in the Bernātu Nature Park.

This progressive biological farm grows some 50 types of biological vegetables and greens.  The farmers own 10 ha of land where they grow various vegetables outdoors and in greenhouses in the Biržu region.