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Published: October 20th 2023
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The roads are fine in the Baltic countries. Though distances are short, it takes time to move from one place to the other. Because the roads are small (only one lane for each direction), you cannot make speed. And then there is Miss Polo ofcourse, our loyal fourwheeler. No sooner I push her to go faster than 90 kilometers/hour, then she begins to complain, ‘You are driving too fast”, she says. Ofcourse I moderate my speed immediately. Not so much because I am afraid to get a fine, but because the way she says it: friendly but unrelenting. Meanwhile we are heading to Tartu in Estonia.
Tartu Tartu is an university town near Lake Peipsi, which forms the border with Russia. Our appartment at Kastani has everything we need but pans to cook. Neither there are spoons. Well, there is just one pan, just enough to warm the pea soup we have taken with us from The Netherlands.
It is a pity we cannot cook properly in our appartment. The old market in the town comes with an huge variety of food: colorfull pumpkins, ten different species of mushrooms, pike, catfish, even sturgeon, probably catched in Lake Peipsi.
Old Market of Tartu
Freshwater fish: sturgeon, catfish and pike-perch Also the supermarket nearby has a stunning diversity of food. Special the fish has our interest: all kinds of herrings and other fishes. Why cannot we have this in The Netherlands?
So the second day instead of cooking these delicacies in our appartment with its one pan, we had an Estonian dinner in town.
The variety on food here is impressing indeed, but what impressed us even more was the variety we found in the Botanical garden of the University. I have never seen so many plant species on such a small area. Everything provided with captions and well maintained. A fiest for the eyes. There are all kinds of biotopes. There are even departments with mosses and grasses. We spent all afternoon in this paradise.
Tartu is a nice, quiet and clean town. We have to leave it though. Our next destination is Vösu, a little town at the Baltic Sea, not far from Tallinn.
Vösu When we arrive at our hotel early in the afternoon the owner turns out to be drunk. He even does not show up. Instead a young woman appeares and she is also drunk. ‘I think this is your room’,
she says, giving us the key. When the owner finally shows up next day he excuses himself. ‘It is off season, you know. Sorry, you are the only guests. I worked all summer very hard and that is why I drank a bit too much yesterday.’ I like him immediately. It looks like he himself is off season as well. He asks me not to name the hotel in my blog. I understand but it is alo a pity because the hotel and the room are absolutely fine.
We walk a bit along the beach. There are hardly shells, only some little ones whick look like
Macoma balthica (sorry), but smaller and thinner. The vegetation spreads out into sea, which is a strange view. Dead rotting plants lay on the shore causing an unplaisant smell.
Almost all houses are made of wood in Vösu. They are from the end 19th/beginning 20th century, when the Russians came here to relax.
Oandu After breakfast we drive to the Laheema National Parc near Oandu. We like to hike the Oandu Old-Growth Forest Nature Trail. The problem is we cannot find the beginning. So we decided just to walk in
the forest a bit. Linda is because of her Slovakian experience with bears afraid to meet one. I am not, because I always used to live in the Netherlands where we only see imaginitive bears on the road.
We are the only ones here. While we walk over a small muddy forest trail, looking carefully around, suddenly instead of a bear two men with guns pop up. They have seen something in the shrubs. Linda and I look at eachother. A bear ofcourse! We turn around and walk quickly to our car.
Finally we find the beginning of the real trail, 3,5 kilometer out of Oandu. Here are some people at least, which makes it saver. Clearly we see traces of bears on the trunks of the pines. As solitary living animals they mark their territory with it. On the trees and on the ground are several species of lichens, which demonstrates that the air is very clear: star-tipped cup lichen, reindeer lichen, finger cup lichen, Iceland moss. There are berries: common bearberry, cowberry European blueberry, crowberry. And there all kinds of mushrooms ofcourse.
Altja While we are driving over little landroads to Altja, suddenly Linda’s cries
out: ‘Stop!’ In the fields stand cranes: two adults with their two youngs. The bird migration is in full swing. Now they collect themselves here and eat and eat. Soon they will leave. Later we see a sky full of cranes indeed, flying in V-formation like geese do.
It has become colder now. We are standing at the coast of the Baltic Sea at Altja. There is a strong wind and it is raining a bit. Altja is an old village with little wooden houses right at the shore. People made a living here as fishermen. But the Russians forced them to stop it for some reason. They placed fences along the beach and cutted some ships in pieces. Now there are only a few people living in the village. Most houses are empty.
The E20 to Tallinn is perfect. It is the first road with four lanes we drive upon. Even Miss Polo does not object, when I drive 100 km an hour. Along the highway parked cars; the owners has disappeared in the woods. Berry and mushroom picking is a national sport.
Tallinn Our appartment in Guesthouse
Valge Villa in the Kristiine area is
a bit far from the center of the city (three kilometers), but it is the most beautiful appartment we have had till now. The hostess is friendly and helpfull.
Tallinn is an open air museum. Despite of all wars it had to withstand, it is still completely intact, unaltered, as it was in medieval times. Even the citywall is still there. We climb the wall and have our lunch there with view over the city. In the afternoon we make a city walk, starting with the old pharmacy, which is already 800 years in use. It feels like walking in a medieval city. At the same time Tallinn is a modern city with huge supermarkets, expensive shops where you can buy amber and the latest fashion. In summer the city seems to be overloaded with tourists, disgorged by huge cruise ships. Now it is quiet. The advance of traveling off season.
We have seen two Baltic capitals now: Vilnius in Lithuania and Tallinn in Estonia. Beautiful cities indeed. Linda and I discuss which one we like most. Linda is tending to Tallinn, I myself to Vilnius. But what about the third capital: Riga? We have to return to
Latvia to find out.
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