Wonderful day with Normunds & our family of 6! - Our visit throughout the Latvian countryside with Normunds was absolutely incredible! We were with my parents and our two young children, and he came prepared with a beautiful car equipped with car seats for the kids, and several options of itinerary routes that we could 'choose as we please' to adjust for our day based on our family's interest (and attention level!). Normunds was a wealth of knowledge on Latvia and was a wonderful guide for us in both Latvian (which my father in law speaks fluently) and English (for the rest of us!). Highly recommend any tour with Normunds or his company!! Thank you for a wonderful experience!

Medieval Castles in Latvia - If you like real medieval castles, then this is the tour for you. We have round towers , walls , halls rooms and dungeons. Lots of medieval weapons on display, as well as other items found during excavations and restoration. These castles are definitely worth visiting.

Wonderful castles and a very nice private tour guide and driver in one 👏🏻 - A great day tour to explore four castles outside of Riga with a very kind and accommodating Jurijs as both our driver and tour guide in one. He was very informative with all our questions and didn’t rush us in spending time in each of the places. On the castles, we specifically liked more the Cēcis Castle with a guided tour and multimedia film on the history of the castle but all the other castles Sigulda and Turaida are also interesting and worth visiting along with the Araisi lake dwelling site and the ski hill. Bravo and Liels Paldies again to Jurijs. 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

Wonderful day tour with kind Jurijs as our tour guide - A great day tour to explore four castles outside of Riga with a very kind and accommodating Jurijs as both our driver and tour guide in one. He was very informative with all our questions and didn’t rush us in spending time in each of the places. On the castles, we specifically liked more the Cēcis Castle with a guided tour and multimedia film on the history of the castle but all the other castles Sigulda and Turaida are also interesting and worth visiting along with the Araisi lake dwelling site and the ski hill. Bravo and Liels Paldies again to Jurijs. 👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

Latvia we love you - Amazing day out Saw a lot of the beautiful Latvian countryside Our guide was amazing - very passionate and knowledable Highly recommended

Tour was great, castles slightly disappointing - The trip was exactly as advertised, but with the added bonus of ‘do whatever you want.’ If you decide that after the first castle you would rather see something else, or once you’ve arrived somewhere you’ve decided it isn’t for you, Normunds can accommodate. He is very knowledgeable about each location and encourages you to take your time. These are all the positives, now for the negatives. Latvian tourism is a burgeoning industry that’s really trying to attract tourists to visit ‘Latvia’ and not ‘Baltic country number 2’. Unfortunately, outside of Riga, the tourist attractions are all Russia-centric which goes against everything the people fought for over countless decades. Each castle was built for the Russians as a security checkpoint for reaching St Petersburg, and they were maintained by the German aristocracy who thought they looked nice. Overall, we arrived for the castles, and we ended up preferring the sections of the tour regarding the local legends, the current economic climate in Latvia and the local cultural elements that make Latvia Latvia. We would still recommend the tour, but mostly because of Normunds’ enthusiasm. The driving was a bit crazy for our taste, with a lot of overtaking on the motorway by driving towards oncoming traffic, but it seems normal around these parts. Bring snacks and an open mind.

Pleasant day in the countryside - While this isn't an essential trip if you're visiting Riga - there are much more spectacular and better curated castles/forts elsewhere in Europe - it is pleasant to see the countryside and learn more about growing up and living in Riga from a local. Eduards, our guide, was congenial, accommodating and happy to share his experiences, which we enjoyed a great deal. We also highly recommend stopping at Araisu Archeological Park. Bring lunch and extra water - it's a long day (8hrs).

Great tour, but forced with other group despite having booked a private tour - Our guide had wonderful, expansive information. He facilitated our maximizing our experience and did not rush us even once. He was polite, friendly, funny, and kind. My one disappointment involved his booking another couple with us even though we had paid for a private tour and declined his texted request to add the other couple. He picked us up with the other couple in the van and said that if we didn't want to share, we could take a private tour the next day. Instead, I asked for money back, since our private tour was no longer private. He offered to pay all our entrance fees, rather than giving a refund. I agreed. Though he paid entrance fees at two places, he refused at the other locations. He did a great job on the actual tour; I just was left feeling a bit lied to and cheated. You'll have a fantastic day; you may or may not have the privacy you paid for and expect.

Just a driver - We thought we would get a tour guide, but what we got was just a driver. He even said he’s “just the driver.” We got little to no information about anything during our trip and he seemed overall disengaged albeit friendly. The description makes it sound like this is a custom tour. It is no such thing. They direct you to the entrance and wait for you to be done. There was an error in the itinerary (no fault of the driver) but he was quick to fix it even though it meant he ended late. Three castles plus a ruins was a bit much for us. I regretted not picking a tour with more diversity in experiences. While the castles were interesting, I would not recommend this tour.

Buyer beware - Based on the reviews I was very excited to take this tour and learn about Latvia. Unfortunately the tour described is not the tour we received. The tour guide remained in the car at each stop and did not speak to us very much at all. There were only two of us on this trip and he did not even ask our names or offer his. When we asked him questions he answered some but was insistent he was not a tour guide but rather just a driver. We noticed after the second stop that we missed a stop and so we asked about that and we were told he was filling in for someone and was just a driver and was told to drive us to three of the four locations. He even showed us the message on his phone with the three locations. In fairness we did circle back for the other location but this meant the tour was longer than planned and when we got to the final stop not everything in the complex was open. When we raised this issue with viator we were told that all services were provided because "they answered questions on topics of interest" We asked four questions 1. Are we in the national park, 2. Are you from Riga, 3 can we stop for lunch, and 4 did we skip a stop. If you are booking this tour only to be transported efficiently from location to location then this tour is probably okay for you. If you are booking this tour and expecting a guide to accompany you and give you information on the places you are visiting and "regale you with stories" as described in the posting you will be sorely disappointed. If you are capable of driving you can rent a car for much much cheaper and have the same experience.