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Published: September 23rd 2013
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Tere! Welcome to Eesti, that's how you say Estonia in Estonian.
Here is where the next stage of my trip continues. The main reason why I chose for Estonia is because a cousin of mine is currently here for a couple of months on an exchange program. Besides, I've never been to the Baltics yet so I took advantage of the opportunity to visit.
I left Iceland back to Italy where I spent one night near Milan at a friend of mine, Gabriele, who I haven't seen for 5 years. We went to Como Lake with another friend I haven't seen in 5 years, Matteo. We were all in Darwin, Australia in the same hostel for some time. In the evening we had a bbq with some other people. The next day I flew with Ryanair to Tallinn.
Estonia is just a little bit bigger than the Netherlands but has just about 1.3 million inhabitants, of which 68% are Estonians, 25% Russians and the rest from other countries (according to the Estonian History Museum in 2010). Estonia is probably the most advanced and modern former Soviet country, with an economy growing faster than most (if not all) other countries of
the European Union. Estonia is part of the EU and Euro is the currency in use. The country has been occupied and ruled by several other countries throughout it's history: Sweden, Denmark, Poland, Russia (Soviet Union) and Germany. The country gained it's independence for the second time in 1991, when the Soviet Union broke up; the first independence was in 1918 and lasted until 1941, when they got occupied by the Soviet Union. Thoughts about Russians in general remain very mixed in Estonia today. I found that people spoke well English here, at least in the cities, something I didn't expect!
Tallinn is the capital and has around 400.000 inhabitants. It's not a huge city, but I found it clean and very beautiful. My hostel was right in the old town, which is surrounded by an old city wall. The city's origin dates back to the 12th / 13th century, therefore it has a real medieval feeling to it. Besides the small old town, Tallinn has also a small modern part with newer buildings, malls, hotels etc. The old town is easy for tourists to walk around and explore, but bring a map because it's like a maze of
streets and alleys that could be confusing sometimes. The city is, obviously, on the UNESCO World Heritage List.
In Tallinn I visited the Estonian History Museum, where you get a much better insight into Estonia's history throughout the centuries. There is also a possibility to walk on a part the old city wall at different points. A visit to the Seaplane Harbour was also worth it. It used to be an old, big hangar for seaplanes and it was converted into a beautiful museum. It shows huge weapons, tanks, boats and other things used during the wars fought in and around Estonia; especially Second World War. It was the first time that I entered a submarine here, called Lembit and was built in the 1930's in the UK. I also spent some time at the Patarei prison. Originally a fortress in the 19th century, it was converted into a prison in 1920 and lasted until 2002, when it had to be closed as one of the requirements for Estonia to join the European Union. It's an interesting place to visit, but I found it harsh and "heavy", much more compared to the Alcatraz in San Francisco which I visited
in 2010. It's old, cells are small and the bunkbeds were horrible. The typical cell itself expresses the depressive mood of the prison. Former cannon rooms of the fortress were divided lengthwise in two rooms with a wall and in each cell there were 16 sleeping places, but often there were 30 people in each cell! There was also a room where, before the Second World War, executions took place by hanging or administering poison. Before Soviet occupation prisoners could walk freely in the yard during their time outside their cells, but during the Soviet occupation they were only allowed in small "boxes" of concrete in the yard.
In Tallinn I went out one night with my cousin and some of her friends and another evening I went to a backpackers bar with some people from the hostel where they had a quizz night and we won. The price was: A card with an x amount of money to spend at the bar, which meant "free beer"! I can't say too much about the nightlife in Tallinn, but it seemed quite vibrant as things go on until late (early) hours of the morning.
Tartu is a smaller city of
roughly 100.000 inhabitants and lies in the east of Estonia. My cousin and I went here for a daytrip. The busride was very comfortable (took 2,5 hours), very nice buses with free wi-fi and each seat had it's own little screen where you could listen to music, watch movies or play games. You need to bring your own earplugs of course. All for just EUR 10,80 each way!
Tartu is known as a student city. The University of Tartu is the biggest and ranked the best in Estonia and was established since the 1600's. The city lies on the banks of the Emajõgi River. We started with a short visit at the market, then went further along the river and the Raekoja Plats with it's colourful buildings and the Tartu Townhall. Here is also were we had some lunch. We walked past the Uspenski cathedral and went for a while into the Botanical Garden which belongs to the university. Behind the main university building we went into the Toomemägi Park, where we saw the ruins of a cathedral which was damaged by Protestans in the 16th century and since then it fell into decay. We found Tartu a nice little
city, but much smaller than we expected.
I took a tour to the northern shore, east of Tallinn, including the
Lahemaa National Park. The park is characterized by its pine trees and bogs (little swamps). Several people have their summer homes in the park along the coast, but it's very limited as they avoid to make it too busy and touristy. At a little village called "Käsmu" we visited a little museum full of artefacts used by local fishermen and locals in general and we had a good lunch: Smoked salmon with typical, black Estonian bread, potatoes and sour cream with pickles. Here we also got the opportunity to see people dancing in their Estonian national dress. We also went to an abandoned Soviet submarine base in the Hala Bay, where they used to demagnatize the submarines so they couldn't be detected. On the way back to Tallinn we also stopped at the Jägala waterfall, which freezes completely during the winter.
Well, I'm of course glad that I've been to Estonia and I learned a little bit about its history. Getting to know a new country is always excited, isn't it?
Thanks for reading, till the next
one!
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