River
Salaca
99 km from source to mouth · Latvia.
LatviaFlows into Gulf of Riga8th longest in Latvia
In numbers
Length
99km
Average flow
31m³/s
Basin
3,421km²
Drop
39m
from 39 m to 0 m
Country
1
The journey
From source to mouth
99 km of river and 8 stops on the way: 6 towns and cities on its banks, dams, bridges and the tributaries that feed it.
- 0 kmLake Burtnieksat 39 m
- 6 kmLake Burtnieks40 km²
- 18 kmMazsalaca1,094 people
- 46 kmĪģetributary
- 54 kmStaicele737 people
- 65 kmRozēni120 people
- 77 kmMērnieki45 people
- 93 kmVecsalaca188 people
- 97 kmSalacgrīva2,435 people
- 99 kmGulf of Rigaat 0 m
Water level along the river (RiverATLAS; the height is exaggerated). Towns: GeoNames and Wikidata; bridges, dams and tributaries: Wikidata.
River in Latvia
At the mouth it carries 31 m³/s on average: an Olympic pool every 80 seconds. It drops from 39 m to 0 m, 0.4 m per kilometre on average. Its basin covers 3,421 km², about the size of CV. 38,000 people live in it. Highest water: April; lowest: from December to March. No large dam holds it back: it is one of the world's free-flowing rivers.
Where to start
- SalacgrīvaLargest city on its banks · 2,435 people
- Pärnu Airport (EPU)Nearest airport with scheduled flights, 75 km from the cityCar hire at RIX airport (Riga)Discover Cars · Affiliate link↗
- On the water7 ferry piers, marinas, boat rentals and boat ramps along the river (OpenStreetMap)
- Kayak and canoe2 put-ins and rapids mapped (OpenStreetMap)
- From June to AugustThe best months to visit
Salaca, month by month
Highest water: April
Lowest water: from December to March. Freezing months (average below −4 °C): from January to February. Best months to visit: from June to August.
From about 22 m³/s in the lowest month to 130 m³/s in the highest. An estimate: the monthly flow is modelled from the lowest and highest months of WaterGAP (RiverATLAS, 1971–2000) and the rain and snow along the river (WorldClim). Dams change the real rhythm. The chip is the average air temperature; below it, the month's rain.
Plan the trip
Plan the trip: boat trips, a bed by the river, a car
Some links above are affiliate links: if you book through them we may earn a commission, at no extra cost to you. It never changes what the data on this page says.
The basin
Salaca: the basin in numbers
3,568 km² of land send their water to this river. This is what lives on it.
- 38,000people live in the basin
- 11/km²people per km²
- 65maverage altitude of the basin
- 650mmof rain a year (basin average)
- 5.4°Caverage air temperature
- 89%protected areas
- 1.6%covered by lakes
What covers the basin
- 44% Forest
- 29% Cropland
- 8% Pasture
RiverATLAS (HydroATLAS v1.0, CC BY 4.0): land cover, people, protected areas, glaciers and dams over the whole basin upstream of the mouth.
Along the river
Salaca: what you find on the way
- 5WaterfallsVelna klēpis and 4 more
- 2Rapids
- 3Boat ramps
- 1Marinas
From OpenStreetMap, within 1.5 km of the river. Not mapped is not the same as not there.
Cross-checked with our atlases
Salaca in our other atlases
What our sister atlases know about the waterfalls on this river, the lakes it flows through, the beaches at its mouth, the mountains where it rises and the islands off its mouth.
1lake on its wayLakeyas
Lakes and reservoirs (1)
Lakes it flows through, by Lakeyas
- Lake Burtniekskm 5 · 4 m deep40km²
Lakeyas is coming soonOpen Lakeyas ↗
From space
The source and the mouth, seen from orbit
Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 by EOX IT Services GmbH (contains modified Copernicus Sentinel data 2016), CC BY 4.0. The glowing line is the river as drawn by RiverATLAS.
Photos
Salaca in pictures
Tributaries
Where it flows, and what flows into it
Tributaries (3)
Also: Īģe, Ramata River, Jaunupe
Nearby
Rivers nearby
Latvia1,020 km680 m³/s81 km awayGaujaLatvia453 km71 m³/s67 km awayPärnu River
Estonia145 km48 m³/s70 km awayLielupeLatvia119 km110 m³/s92 km awayNavesti RiverEstonia102 km280 m³/s88 km awayKasari RiverEstonia115 km37 m³/s119 km awayOgre RiverLatvia203 km18 m³/s107 km awayPedja RiverEstonia125 km11 m³/s138 km awayWhere these numbers come from
| Name, length, places | Wikidata (Q1426007) · CC0 |
|---|---|
| Course, profile, basin | RiverATLAS v1.0 (HydroATLAS, Linke et al. 2019) · CC BY 4.0 — followed from the source to the mouth given by Wikidata |
| Flow | WaterGAP (RiverATLAS), 1971–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Climate along the river | WorldClim (RiverATLAS), 1970–2000 · CC BY 4.0 |
| Towns, bridges, dams | Wikidata · CC0; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0 |
| Along the river | © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL |
| Images | EOX Sentinel-2 cloudless 2016 · CC BY 4.0; Wikimedia Commons |
| Our other atlases | Lakeyas — Wikidata · CC0; © OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL; GeoNames · CC BY 4.0; HydroLAKES · CC BY 4.0; NOAA OISST |
Every source and licence is on the data sources page.
The family
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