Advertisement
Published: August 11th 2014
Edit Blog Post
Lower gate
Tallinn old town Tartu is about 4 hours from Riga through country similar to what I have seen since Minsk, the very comfortable bus continued on to St Petersburg after I disembarked. First task was to buy my last bus ticket to Tallin, which I did before popping into Mcdonalds for a Royale with cheese (a very tasty burger). A taxi was next, it had a meter so no rip off for once, my hotel is a fair way from the centre but cheap in comparison to what I would pay in the old town. My room has no aircon and as usual I am cooking, I have decided to do nothing this afternoon as there probably isnt enough here to keep me busy for two days, so tomorrow I will go explore.
I caught a local bus in to town, Tartu has a small but interesting old town set between the river and the 300 year old university on the hill, not a huge amount to see but I did get some souvenirs here. I then spent a few hours drinking beers and enjoying the cool breeze at a bar down on the river before walking the 3 or 4 km back
out to the hotel.
It has been unnaturally hot according to the locals and my room stifling so I was shocked when I checked out and walked out into a cool rainy morning, unfortunately by the time the bus reached Tallinn the rain was gone and the sun was coming out again. It is such a relief not having to argue with taxi drivers in this country, I was soon at my lodgings in the old town although I could not check in for a few hours as my room was not yet ready.
So I spent three or four hours wandering the old town, which really is a stunning place unfortunately it is crowded in tour groups and as a result very expensive. It is Saturday so many may be day trippers from Helsinki perhaps, it is difficult to find any room to move in the high city, but not so bad if you move away from the main thoroughfares in the lower part of the old city. I stopped to get a meal at a cafe when the waitress told me the President of Estonia was sitting at the table next to me no need foe
security here it seems.
Today I walked down to the ferry harbour and bought my last ticket for the trip, my ferry departs Tuesday at 2.45pm. I then hopped on one of those city tour buses and did the red city tour before heading out to the zoo. Initially I wasnt to happy with what I saw, it looked a bit like an Australian zoo in the 70's but although some animals remain in ugly concrete and iron cages, there was a sign explaining that this will change when funding can be arranged. I saw raccoons and a few other species I havent seen in the flesh before. I hopped on trolley bus to get back to the old town having a meal and visiting a supermarket before returning to my hotel.
I did nothing but read and pop out for a feed today, it is time to move on.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.075s; Tpl: 0.013s; cc: 9; qc: 27; dbt: 0.0542s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
D MJ Binkley
Dave and Merry Jo Binkley
Estonia
Love photos like this one.