Lasīt tālāk
19.Oct
1836 - FIRST DAY OF THE SIXTH EXPEDITION
03 Sep
- 2016 -
Author
Andis Pikāns
2016-09-14
“My passion – preserving and studying of our local history, making pictures of the beauty of people and nature, singing in a church choir and organization of cultural events,” says Aldis Pušpurs, who has gathered and created a collection of forestry in Egļava.
His story started with collecting of forestry artifacts. His biggest motivation was joint-stock company’s “Latvijas valsts meži” announcement that Latvia has poor forestry traditions. Pušpurs thinks that pre war time and also during Soviet regime forestry was at it’s best level. That is one of the reasons why Aldis passionately collects different forestry artifacts – literature, old maps, documents, photos of employees and their work, a collection of entomology, tools, samples of trees and furniture made out of wood, especially chairs.
Its all now stored in ranger’s Kārlis Dzērve house, barn. Now it’s a tourist accommodation. It’s a monument to Egļavas forestry, to all who have worked there and their heritage.
It’s perfectly quiet here. A great place for a traveler who wants to know more about Latvian history.
Aldis shows us how to find a way to Stompaku swamp where we find memorial place for Vilis Samsons red guerillas.
Few kilometers further, at the other side of the swamp national guerillas bunkers are located. After WW2 a group of brave men lead by Pēteris Supe resisted the Soviet occupation.
There is no way we can go there with motorcycles so we have to walk around one kilometer. We decide to return to Alūksne where we will start our next expedition as we can leave our bikes there and also we want to go back to using old Ieriķi-Abrene railroad track from Žīguri to Balvi. The railroad line was constructed at the beginning of 20th century and it had strategic meaning in the World War I. During the independency of Latvia there was a train line from Riga to Leningrad. Now the tracks are completely dismantled. But it’s very exciting for motorbikes now! We can see old station buildings, making a surreal feeling.
Despite the rain and bad weather, we decide to visit Jaunannas manor and it’s old hunting castle that was built in 1904 by baron Aksel fon Delvig. The manor seems abandoned and squalid. From the information we found it belongs to Latvia forest service.
In Alūksne, we roll in Renārs parent’s house backyard. We are wet, tired but happy.
