Tallinn day 2, 2006-04-28

Tallinn with guide

Does 8 degrees and rain compared with almost 20 degrees and sunshine matter when you are a tourist. The answer is definitely YES. Tallinn offered wonderful spring weather where people sat on the outdoor coffée shops in T-shirts and if we would have had bad weather the experience would only been worth half.

The silhouette of Tallinn appears out of the morning mist.


Elaine is watching Tallinn coming closer


The first time setting foot on Estonian ground


We started with a round tour in the bus and a walk around the Old Town


Here is one of the best preserved towers out of the
20 remaining. This is the highest and most dominant of the all.

Alexander Nevsky Cathedral was built by the Russians and inaugurated 1900. They built it on the top of the Tower Mountain to show who was the boss in Estonia at that time. They succeeded because still today it is one of the most eye-catching profiles in Tallinn. It is not mentioned in my Estonian tourist book that I bought.

St Olavs’ Church was built in 1240 i memory of a Norwegian saint. In the area where it was built there was a Scandinavian marketplace and the church was with its 159 meters the tallest building in the world for a while.

Our guide Kristel told us with a great knowledge all about her city, her country and her people. She radiated pride over everything she showed us and told us with vivid realization the suffering of the Estonians through history, almost always under the rule of a foreign power but despite that they have always preserved their identity and culture as Estonians.

Middelage meets today


Claes.. can you translate?


We stayed at Meriton Hotel only a stone’s throw from the town wall. A good hotel
built as late as 1999. The hotel gave a voucher of 100 Estonian Crowns per person
that you could spend on anything at the hotel. A very nice initiative.


The compulsary picture from the hotel window

The town wall was originally 4 km long, 3 meters thick and 16 meter high with 60 watchtowers. It was built between the 15th and 17th century. Today remains 1.85 km of the original wall

In the evening half of our group went out having a nice dinner at ”Peppersack”.
It was in an old business house and was very authentic. It is said that Tallinn is built
of salt because that was a very important source of income during the Hansa period






Elaine is testing the home brewed "Honey Beer"


Bärnsten in Tallinn. Our familyname Bärnsten is in English Amber.


Here Elaine takes her annual cigarrette. Perhaps because she had also taken her annual beer.

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