The travels of Tim and Megan: Tallinn, Estonia

Saturday

We were pretty glad to get off the ferry in Tallinn and leave the crazy Finns to get on with their drinking. We had a little trouble finding our hotel. We knew it was pretty much right next to the ferry terminal, but it was well hidden and we wandered around in the dark for a while before tracking it down. It was a great place to stay, though. Good location close to the Old Town and our room was really nice. We were happy to be in Estonia!

Estonia is a country in the Baltic region of northern Europe. It is bordered by Latvia to the south, Russia to the east and has the Baltic Sea to the west and the Gulf of Finland to the north. The population of Estonia is just 1.35 million, making it one of the least populous members of the European Union. Tallinn is the capital and largest city, with a population of around 415,000. Tallinn is also the European Capital of Culture for 2011!

Sunday

After a bit of a sleep in, we had a fairly typical breakfast buffet at the hotel - bread, fruit and yoghurt, sausages, baked beans, juice. Excellent. We then set off to explore the old town of Tallinn. We had heard from a number of people that Tallinn was beautiful, but it was even more spectacular than we had imagined. The morning was cloudy and drizzly, but by afternoon the sky was blue and the sun was shining.

We wandered through the cobble stone streets, admiring the colourful and pretty medieval buildings and checking out some of the souvenir stores. There was plenty of amber for sale, as it is abundant in the Baltic States, as well as lots of Russian dolls, jewellery, wool and linen products and other crafts. We found the Tourist Information Centre and got some info on various tours and then we had a drink at one of the cafes in the beautiful Town Hall square (main square). The sun was shining by this stage and it was actually quite hot. We watched the waiters and waitresses rushing up to tourists in the square, trying to entice them into their cafes.

We continued to explore the old town, checking out shops, churches and the fortification towers and walls, which are still largely intact, and we made our way up to the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral, a picturesque Russian Orthodox church opposite the Estonian parliament building, which is pink of all colours! We had awesome pizza for lunch at a nice restaurant on Viru Street in the centre of the old town and then ventured outside of the old town walls (to the new town, we suppose) to check out one of the huge department stores and use the internet.

Later in the afternoon, we walked back around the edge of the old town to our hotel via the Alkoholopood, where we picked up some exceptionally cheap beer and cider as well as some snacks, which we consumed while watching some of the Athletics World Champs in our hotel room. We can now confirm that the sport of hammer throw is a ridiculous one. We also managed to book ourselves a bus from Tallinn to Vilnius, Lithuania for just 20 euros each. Bargain!

In the evening we walked back into the old town and found a great little restaurant where we both had a delicious chicken and rice dish. After dinner we went for a walk through the old town. It was so pretty all lit up at night. It was a nice still evening, although a bit chilly after dark.

Monday

Tim got up early and trekked across the other side of the old town to do some laundry at the laundromat. The women working there spoke no English, so there was a rather hilarious mime session and much pointing by Tim and one of the women to convey that we indeed wanted all of clothes both washed and dried. With chores out of the way, we discovered a brilliant market just across the road from our hotel - the Sadama market. It sold literally everything you could imagine short of livestock.

It was a stunning day - hot, sunny, perfect blue sky. We loved Tallinn even more! We wandered into the old town, past the Fat Margaret Tower, a huge round tower that was once part of the town wall fortifications. You can see from the photo below just how big it is. It has become one of the icons of Tallinn and you can buy all sorts of souvenirs relating to the tower.

On our morning walk we stumbled across a lovely little square, beneath St Nicholas Church, that had sun loungers scattered all over it, so we lay in some sun loungers for a while, thinking about how much better that was than working. We joined a walking tour of the old town from 12-2pm. It was really well done. The tour guide was excellent and he gave us so many interesting facts and figures and he told us a few stories (both fact and myth) about Tallinn and Estonia. We visited the Estonian War of Independence Victory Column, a few of the main churches, some lookout platforms on the higher part of the old town with stunning views and the town walls and fortification towers. The walking tour was superb.

We had lunch at a fantastic Texan restaurant called Honky Tonk Canteen. It had all sorts of delicious American food (massive servings as you would expect) and was quite cheap too. After lunch, we pretty much rolled through the old town with packed stomachs, enjoying the hot weather and the beautiful surroundings. The town was over-run with Northern Ireland football supports (Northern Ireland were playing Estonia in a Euro 2012 qualifier match on the Tuesday night and a big contingent had made the journey to eastern Europe for a long (and thirsty) weekend). A large group of them hung about in an Irish pub in the main square all day Monday, singing and chanting. It kind of ruined the tranquil atmosphere of Tallinn's town centre, but was also quite amusing.

We were inspired by the Irish and decided to check out a few of Tallinn's pubs in a mini pub crawl of our own. In truth, we actually only made it to two pubs - the Drink Bar and Hell Hunt. Hell Hunt is actually the Estonian translation for Gentle Wolf, and it has an interesting logo of a large wolf carrying a naked lady on its back... It was the first Estonian pub registered after Estonia regained independence in 1991. It was nice to relax with a few beers after a lot of walking and exploring over the past few days.

We rounded out the day with an awesome dinner at a place called Porgu. Megan had salmon and Tim had a pork chop. They had ridiculously heavy chairs - like about 50kg each. There was no way of stealing those bad boys. It was a bit of a struggle to get up the steps out of the restaurant after dinner as it was. Another solid day in Estonia!

Tuesday

We had a sleep in and then breakfast in the hotel on Tuesday. It was a grey morning, with patches of drizzle. Not ideal. After breakfast we made our way to Hotel Viru for the 11.30am KGB tour. The KGB used to have the top floor of the hotel to themselves, where they had offices and spy equipment stored to allow them to keep tabs on any foreign hotel guests during the Soviet Occupation era. The tour was really well presented. It was crazy to believe that the extreme lengths the KGB went to in order to spy on pretty ordinary people, and that this occurred up until the late 1980s! Our tour guide, who cannot have been much older than us, vivdly remembers getting training in putting on a gas mask (in case of some attack) when she was at school as a 5 or 6 year old!

It had started pouring while we were in the hotel tour. It had improved slightly by the time our tour ended, so it was only drizzling, as we walked from the Hotel Viru back in to the old town. We headed for the main square, where we visited the Raeapteek pharmacy. This is the oldest continuously functioning pharmacy in the world. Records show that it was in operation as early as 1422, but it was probably earlier than that. It has been passed down through the generation of the same family for centuries. It is now part modern day pharmacy and part museum of weird and wonderful things that it used to sell back in the Middle Ages - including herbs, snake skins, toads, insects, a mummified human hand and deer penises to name but a few. Very strange place.

Just along from the pharmacy, we found a great little cafe that had an amazing assortment of cakes, so we popped in there to dodge some rain and we got a piece of cake each and a hot chocolate for Tim and a tea for Megan. Delicious! We then visited a Russian flea market down behind the railway station. It was actually quite crap and the rain was still falling, so we abandoned that fairly quickly and headed for the hotel.

We managed to get on the computer in the lobby of the hotel next to ours without any complaints from management. It appeared to be the only computer in Estonia with a functioning USB port, so we could download photos and do some blog! We also decided to use the pool and spa complex of the hotel next door. We got 90 minutes in the indoor swimming pool, spas and saunas for an excellent price. Great way to spend a wet afternoon. After some wine and snacks in our hotel room, we had dinner at our favourite Texan restarant, the Honky Tonk Canteen. Again, it was excellent. Again, we walked home very full. It was quite a nice evening. The rain and cloud had cleared away and we were hopeful of a cracking day on Wednesday.

Wednesday

Sure enough, Wednesday morning was bright and sunny, although there was a bit of breeze about. After breakfast and checking out of the hotel, we caught a public bus from central Tallinn out to a suburb called Pirita. Pirita is a lovely area on the coast, with a white sandy beach and a nice little marina with dozens of yachts and a view back to the old town of Tallinn. We walked through a small forest of pine trees and then along the beach to the marina. There was not a lot happening in Pirita, so after our walk we caught the bus back into the city - bus was full and not pleasant smelling.

Back in the old town we walked to St Olav's Church. The church was built in the 12th century and by the 15th century, the church was 159 metres tall. The motivation for such a massive steeple must have been as a maritime post, to make the trading city of Tallinn visible from far out at sea. Between 1549 and 1625, the church was the tallest building in the world. After several lightning strikes, the height was reduced and it is now around 123 metres tall. We climbed the steep steps of the tower up to the viewing platform, where got breath-taking views of Tallinn's old town and out to sea. The interior of the church itself was actually quite plain and boring - another Lutheran church!

We grabbed some lunch at Hell Hunt (solid club sandwich and salad) and in the afternoon we visited the Museum of Occupation, which depicted in graphic detail the terrifying occupations of Estonia by Nazi Germany during WWII and then by the Soviet Union, the latter lasting right up until the early '90s. The museum was brilliant - loads of information and we wished we had more time there. But, as we had an overnight bus to catch, we had to move on. We had dinner at our favourite restaurant in Tallinn - the Honky Tonk Canteen and then we grabbed our luggage from the hotel and made our way to the bus station.

Our bus left Tallinn at 10.30pm and arrived in Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, at 6.40am on Thursday, passing through Latvia on the way. The bus was comfortable and we managed to get a decent enough sleep. Strangely there were no border checkpoints at all, which made for a better sleep but also meant we got no Baltic stamp action in our passports.