Kolka Cape border guard observation tower

The border guard tower is hidden in the last pines of Cape Kolka, where the border guard post was constantly located in the USSR and the small wall next to it is now abandoned and destroyed by destiny ... The top of the tower now looks a little also observed by our border guards, who now appear to have been replaced by modern electronic radar equipment that probably meets all NATO standards.

During the USSR, border guards observed and controlled the waters of the Irbe Strait from this tower, and at that time it was often said that even a duck could not swim through this strait without the knowledge of the border guards. The Irbe Strait separated the Small Sea or the Gulf of Riga from the Great Sea or the open waters of the Baltic Sea. A concept like the High Seas has long since disappeared from our vocabulary with the departure of the Soviet army and has been successfully forgotten. The high seas - a concept that originated during the Cold War and meant an area from which a threat to the vast Soviet land could arise and come, or, no less bad - someone who could decide to cross the Iron Curtain and get across the sea to the blowing West, taking with him an important and inexpressible secret of the Soviet Union. Therefore, this strait, which is so similar to the neck of the bottle, was very controlled and watched. And these functions were performed not only by the armed border guard and a radar station at the end of the Kolka Cape tower with binoculars and Kalashnikov machines, but also by the border guard patrol ships, which were constantly in this strait. Each boat and vessel crossing the strait was carefully inspected as necessary. These sailors in particular did not like sailors, whom they probably considered to be capitalist-rich style runners-up. That is why often deliberately border guard patrol ships approached very quickly and broke the sides of their yachts by mooring on their sides - say, there is nothing to wander around here! This is how many yachts that passed through the Irbe Strait were deliberately inspected. It is also worth noting that in Soviet times, appearing on the Cape of Kolka to enjoy the roar of the sea and the distant Kolka lighthouse was not so easy, because there was a special area that could not be entered so easily, you needed passes. And if someone pulled the camera out of their bag here, it could end up with forced film lighting at best or detention, identification and maybe even interrogation at worst ....