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Published: July 28th 2017
Hello my fellow travellers!
I woke up early in the morning and took the very first bus out of Narva, heading to the capital of Estonia, Tallinn. During my travel I have heard a lot of great things about Tallinn and how it''s one of the most beautiful cities in the Baltic countries so I was certainly looking forward to going there.
The weather was a bit dull when I arrived and I was getting pretty hungry so I started slow by dodging into a kebab restaurant at the outskirts of the old town, getting a bite to eat and surfing the web for a moment while waiting for the rain to blow over.
Once the rain subsided I headed towards the closest spot on my list of places to visit, the
KGB Muuseum which is located inside the Viru Hotel belonging to the Sokos Hotels. It's located there because during the Soviet times the KGB basically owned a floor of the hotel, floor 23, from where they spied on all it's guests and dignitaries as well as the rest of Tallinn's inhabitants of course.
I really wanted to visit it, there was just a small problem.
It is very popular and you need to book it in advance and it's rather expensive, 12 euro for an hour tour. To be honest I felt that it was a bit to hefty and that would not be the first time that thought passed through my head in Tallinn!
Since I couldn't visit the museum I instead opted to just head straight into the old town instead and just look around. The first thing that caught my eyes was of course the very iconic
Viru Värava, the beautiful gate that stands as the entrance to the old town centre
. There was a throng of tourists there so it was hard to get good pictures of it. Again, this was something that was quite reflective of Tallinn, there are a lot of tourists here with the harbour being just a stone's throw away and boatload after boatload of tourists arriving there.
I decided to follow the city wall to see where it led me and it took me to
Katkenud Liin, a monument which stands in memory of the disaster of when the cruise ship
Estonia broke apart and sunk in 1994 with 852 dead, making it the
deadliest maritime disaster to hit European waters during peacetime. I remember that night very clearly even though I was young when it happened because there was a lot of Swedes on the ship when it sank and it was reported on very heavily. Many people in Sweden knew someone who died in that tragedy.
Next to the monument stands the impressive
Paks Margareeta, a massive coastal defence tower, and
Suur Rannavärav, a coastal gate. It strikes an imposing figure and tucked away inside of it is
Eesti Meremuuseum, a nice little maritime museum. I decided to go inside and visit the museum since it also gave access to the roof and obviously the tower itself. Entrance was a bit much in my opinion at six euro and I can honestly say that it didn't really feel worth it and I guess that now it really began to dawn on me, Tallinn's old town is really all about the tourism and the money it brings.
Everything here costs, even the small churches, such as
Püha Vaimu Kirik, have entrance fees and many places have multiple entrance fees for different parts of it and the entrance fees generally range from
five euro up to 15 euro, this is a city area turned into a tourism cash cow. Since I felt a bit disappointed by the maritime museum (it's not bad, it's just not worth that asking price) I decided to be a bit wary of entering other sites today and research it more properly in the evening to decide what might be worth the cost and see what my new host Martin might recommend.
Instead I walked around the old town enjoying the outside of the sights without going inside, with a couple of exceptions such as
Oleviste Kogudus, a church that venerates Saint Olaf, which has free entry but a three euro fee to go up into the tower. I also visited the two orthodox churches
Püha Nikolai Imetegija Kirik and
Aleksander Nevski Katedraal which are both completely free as well as
Tallinna Peeter-Pauli Katedraal which is free but with an entrance fee to the adjacent monastery.
I also took a look at
Katariina Gild and
Püha Katariina Kirik, a guild and a church dedicated to Saint Catherine, as well as the church
Kaarli Kirik. On my walk I also passed by
Mustpeade Maja, a house that
used to belong to the Brotherhood of the Blackheads which was a guild of unmarried merchants. I also took a peek as
Suurgild, which used to be a large guild house, and the
Kolm Õde, it's known internationally as the three sisters, which is three beautiful old merchant houses that are now a hotel instead. Of course I also took a peak at the beautiful
Tallinna Raekoda, the former town hall. I also visited the
Vabadussõja Võidusammas, a monument to the victory in the war of independence. It's located close to the church
Jaani Kirik, and the
Vabaduse Kell, a clock commemorating the freedom of Estonia.
You don't really need to enter anywhere though, the old town is exceptionally beautiful (despite all the tourists roaming around), and it's perfectly lovely to just walk around and take in the general atmosphere and I had no problems enjoying myself just walking around here.
I walked through the old town and headed up past
Niguliste Kirik, to
Toompea with it's many gorgeous towers such as
Kiek in de Kök (which means peeking into the kitchen because you could peek into several kitchens from it's battlements),
Pikk Hermann and the castle
Toompea Loss which today houses the Parliament of Estonia. I also tried to visit
Tallinna Neitsi Maarja Piiskoplik Toomkirik, the main cathedral in Tallinn, but it was closed due to a concert so it will have to wait until tomorrow.
Up on
Toompea are several vantage points which offer an absolutely amazing view of Tallinn and I enjoyed a good leisure time up there just taking in the gorgeous view. Up there are also the beautiful
Stenbocki Maja, which functions as the seat of the Estonian Government. It was built by the Swedish count Jakob Pontus Stenbock with the intention of being a courthouse but due to the Russo-Turkish War draining the treasury the state became indebted to him and instead the building came into his private possession. It remained private property up until 1899 when it finally became a courthouse as originally intended.
After that private walking tour, which lasted several hours, just traversing the beautiful narrow streets the time came to make my way over to Martin, I was given a really pleasant surprise as he was waiting for me with a delicious barbecue ready to go and a bottle of the best tasting Vodka I've ever
drunk. We had an amazing evening together, eating and drinking to our hearts content while having a really great and rewarding discussion lasting to the wee hours.
He gave me some really good tips for tomorrow, he especially recommended me to visit the
Kumu Kunstimuuseum, an art museum located a bit off from the historic centre, so I've decided to do that and he also recommends me to go the Pirita area and the botanical gardens there so I will strive to go there as well, but it's in the completely opposite direction from
Kumu Kunstimuuseum so I might not be able to visit them both tomorrow.
I checked a bit on the web and found out that there is a Tallin Card which gives access to pretty much every attraction in the city as well as to the public transport. It costs 25 euro and considering how every place here is expensive to enter on it's own and the public transport is two euro for every single ride it seems like a good investment so I will go the Viru Hotel first thing in the morning and pick up a 24 hour version and then I will
hit pretty much all the sights I passed today and visit them more properly. I guess you can view today as a bit of a warm up and preparation for tomorrow.
Until tomorrow I wish you all peace and happy travels!
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Dancing Dave
David Hooper
Tallinn
Looks like a beautiful city Per-Olof. I have posted some of your pics in the Cathedrals, grand churches & places of worship thread in the Photography Forum. Thanks.