Transcontinental eclipse trip for Zadraks family

By RICHIE HALL
sports@readthereporter.com

CARMEL – The out-of-state cars were already in Carmel the day before the solar eclipse.

Many of them were from Illinois, easily a short drive to see such a rare event. There were a couple vehicles from Ohio, and cars from Iowa, Wisconsin, Arizona, and even California.

But it’s likely that the Zadraks family made the longest trip to see the eclipse. The Zadrakses are from Latvia, one of the Baltic countries of Northern Europe.

Latvia’s capital is Riga, and a flight from there to Indianapolis takes nearly 15 hours. Gints Zadraks, along with his wife Marika and daughter Zile, live in Riga. Gints’ father Vilis Zadraks was also there; he is from Valmiera, about an hour-and-a-half drive from the capital.

Gints Zadraks first learned about Carmel when he met Andris Berzins, a Latvian-American who is an Honorary Consul between Latvia and Indiana. Berzins is the president of the Carmel & Jelgava Sister Cities Committee, Jelgava being one of several sister cities of Carmel.

“I was working in Washington (D.C.) for our embassy,” said Zadraks. He currently works in economic affairs at the Embassy of the Republic of Latvia to the United States.

Zadraks and his family were making their third visit to Carmel. “We basically came to see the eclipse,” he said. “And of course, visit friends.”

“I like it here,” said Zadraks. “The city’s so beautiful and so livable. We got a chance to walk around the city center, to sit down, to grab a beer.”

Vilis Zadraks was making his first visit to Carmel, and Gints Zadraks said his father likes it here as well. Gints Zadraks said they enjoy being around the people in the U.S.

“We like to be around Americans,” said Gints Zadraks.