A lone bicycle as a monument? Why not – this is Riga, and even such a modest monument has a right to exist here.
Next to the Old Town, in the center of Riga, there is the large Esplanade Park, very quiet and beautiful. On its grounds there are quite a lot of historic and interesting landmarks. For example, the Academy of Arts, the Nativity of Christ Cathedral, the Latvian National Museum of Art. You can spend a great deal of time getting to know them, practically the whole day. So afterward we advise you to relax on the central alley of the park, on the comfortable benches. Right there you will see this original sculpture. Where did it come from, what does it symbolize?
The Bicycle Monument was installed in the Esplanade in 2011, but in essence it cannot really be called a monument, rather a symbol. It arrived in Riga from Holland, straight from Amsterdam, as a gift from the Embassy of the Netherlands in honor of the 20th anniversary of Latvia's independence. In the capital of Holland, bicycles are more popular than anywhere else in Europe. This gesture, though a little extravagant, is actually quite a telling sign of the friendly attitude of European countries toward Latvia, which gained its independence comparatively recently.
