Passport to Tallinn: Part Three

First let me start off by saying I am sorry it has been, dare I say, years since my last blog post. The last time I wrote anything was about Tallinn, Estonia in November 2018 to be exact. It isn’t that I lost my love for travel or writing. The one word I hate to use is procrastination but it is what it is. I kept putting off writing; not the travel since my next trip was the following year to Lithuania and then again in 2023 to Latvia. Don’t worry I plan to write about those trips and won’t wait years before writing about them. Besides the trips to Europe, I did take some trips in the U.S. during the time when Covid hit.

Now onto Part Three: Passport to Tallinn as promised. I realized in the previous part I was going to talk about places within the old town that helped me fall in love with it. Alas I ended up talking about visiting one of the cemeteries in the city. Of course, Siselinna Kalmistu is not in the old town. It is a bit of a walk from it and you can easily get lost if you do not have a decent app on your phone to help you navigate your way around. Even with using the app, I still managed to get somewhat lost. I say somewhat because you can always find your way around as long as you keep an eye on the landmarks around you which is what I did.

But I digress, since I wanted to talk a bit about the old town and what I loved about it. Its town square is by far one of my favorite squares that I have seen from my travels. Maybe it is because it connects restaurants, shops, cobblestone streets and churches to the square along with the red rooftops that you can see from the top of one of the churches. There was something magical about this part of the city that made me fall in love with it. For one thing, I found it to be a very safe place to walk around at night. During one of these walks, I found the Old Dominican Monastery so you know I had to walk through it….. Another thing I found on one of my walks through this area was all of the hidden courtyards that I stumbled upon without even looking for it.

I did manage to venture a bit away from the old town by finding my way to Kadriog Park and Palace. It was easier for me to find then I thought. I am sure it helped that I found an off-line map that I could use during my travels. Again, I digress, I do realize I should’ve read up on the days that it would be open since I made my way there on a Tuesday. They happen to be closed on the one day I show up. With my luck, I had read on Tripadvisor they would be open that day so I didn’t think anything of it. Now, if you do plan a visit to the palace, please note that it’s closed on Mondays and Tuesdays and public holidays. The rest of the week it opens at 10 o’clock.

I ended up walking around the park grounds on that Tuesday. I did make my way there on another day and realized I was completely happy just walking around the grounds and not even walking through the palace.

Besides visiting the old town and Kadriorg Park; I did manage to pay three euros to walk along the city wall. I am glad I did this and that’s coming from someone who has a slight fear of heights. All I can say is this gave me a different view from the city by walking along the wall. I was able to wind my way down from the wall and walk towards Hirvepark and ran into the church at the end of the road from Toompea.

Now you’re probably wondering, did I stay in the city or did I decide to be a little adventurous and venture further out?

Drumroll please…. I let the adventure take over and decided to take a tour outside of the city.

I booked the tour through The Knight House where I was staying for the entirety of my trip. The tour they booked me with was Toth Tours. I chose Lahemaa National Park as the excursion I wanted to see away from the capital. The cost for this particular tour was 40 euros which roughly came out to $50 U.S. dollars. Not bad for the day …. Our tour guide was Victor Manuel who was very knowledgeable of where we were headed. The tour consisted of eight people which made it nice. Not having a lot of people on the bus or throughout this experience made it more personable and not crowded. The first stop on the way to the park was Jagala waterfall. I couldn’t believe it when I saw it because it doesn’t look anything like what you would consider your typical waterfall. Or is there such a thing as your ‘typical’ anything? ’ What I mean is the water looked rusty. Then again they do sell a lot of amber around here and that is what it made me think of is that particular color.

The next stop on the tour was an abandoned mansion. This was one of my favorite parts of the tour. I only wished I could have walked through every room and done some exploring. At least I was able to walk around the grounds. Better than anything. Anyway if you ever find your way to this country; you should add Kolga manor to your list of places to visit. You didn’t think this was the only mansion I was able to see the outside of, did you? After leaving the mansion, we headed to another mansion which I believe was called Pigeon House. Do you know why it is called this? It got its name because messenger pigeons would find their way back home to the gatehouse that was located right as you entered the grounds.

Upon leaving the second mansion, we made our way to the park. It is interesting to say the least. It wasn’t and I am going to use this work again, your ‘typical’ or should I say my ‘typical’ park that I have visited. I walked through the bog which is basically peat. There is a path for you to walk on which is wood boards or slants because if you don’t keep to them then the peat has this squishy feel to it and you would feel like you were sinking into it. The wood slants were at the beginning where we started all the way through to where we met our tour guide at the end. To give you a description of these slants, they started out wide and then the further you went into the bog the narrower they would get. That was a little scary for me since there was water on both sides of the boards as we were making our way to the other end of this adventure.

How could I forget the watch tower or this traditional estonian swing I got to go on with this tour. The water tower was at the beginning of the park and the swing was after we left the park. How could I forget this swing since I got smacked with it. Let me explain: It was a big swing where you have two people on one side of the swing and the two on the other side of it. The swing would keep going faster and faster. I saw how it was done with the four before me and I thought I wouldnt have to do it. Alas I did. It was nerve wracking because I felt as if I was on a ferris wheel looking down. I held on for dear life …. You are probably wondering how do you slow the swing down so you can exit it? Well, to slow it down, you have to stand still until the swing slows down. Then the tour guide held onto it for us so we could depart. This is where I smacked myself. I should have backed up and instead of doing that , I went around to the side and ran into the wood pole that was part of the contraption. How embarrassing for me?

To end the tour, we stopped and had lunch. I wish I had gotten the name of the place where we stopped. I ended up ordering the fish which was stuffed with something that resembled spinach, boiled potatoes and salad which to me looked like coleslaw. I noticed their main staples for food appear to be pork, boiled potatoes and they seem to love dill. After lunch, we drove along the coastline making our way back to the city and the place I am calling home for the time I am here.