I walked out the door of the hotel that cold morning, hoping to catch a sunrise like I did in Minsk and a sunset such as the one in Helsinki — only to find snow on the ground; and snow was still falling…
…but a closer look revealed to me something which I do not recall ever seeing before: the precipitation was more like puffy miniature snowballs than snowflakes.
Graupel Fell From the Sky in Riga One Morning
Looking up this weather phenomenon later, I found out that the term for this form of precipitation is called graupel — which is defined by the National Weather Service of the United States as “Same as snow pellets or small hail”, with which I disagree because hail is usually hard; and these pellets were as soft as snow — and as a lay meteorologist, I had never heard of it.
At first, I thought the snow — or graupel — combined with the cold air would ruin the morning…
…until I realized that the streets of Riga were practically deserted — and then I approached the Old Town area.
I then realized how peaceful, serene and picturesque was the city that morning — almost as if I had Latvia all to myself.
The greenery alongside the banks of the Pilsētas Kanāls were instead covered with a soft frozen white blanket.
I reflected upon the reflections of the canal and realized that I was about to have a mellow time exploring at my pace the Old Town area of the city.
Summary
The morning — and, ultimately, the day — turned out to be a nice one spent in Riga; and I intend to post additional photographs in future articles.
All photographs ©2017 by Brian Cohen.
