Stew and Niki Tallinn and Helsinki

In the morning I woke up to the sound of the lads snoring, had a cold shower (woke me up a treat) and headed to say goodbye to Juri. He got out of his bed, washed his face and, refusing to take no for an answer, he walked me to the station. A brief train journey to town and I managed to get a 5hour bus to Tallinn. Halfway through the journey and extremely hungry (nothing to eat all day) we stopped to have a pit stop (the driver wanted a fag). As the bus started moving again I ran to the front to tell the driver that the lady sitting next to me on the bus wasn't there... He spoke almost no English 'yes, ok!' I tried again and so did some other tourists...he was having none of it and we continued.

I waited with all the brought brides for our british partners. Niki arrived and we caught the bus to Tallinn. The hotel is lush, with the luck continuing from Riga we have landed another festival!

A massive burger and live music on the square went down a treat. Tallinn is so good! The weather and the architecture explained the popularity with tourists from all over the world. Our hotel is as close to the main square in Old Town as it is possible to be. The only thing which let's Tallinn down is the amount of tourists, because of this it's the most expensive place we've been but you can't be a tourist and complain about them.

Now, to be a full on tourist! After a trip to the tourist information, we set about doing as much in Tallinn (mainly free stuff) that we could. We walked around the town and the wall, we saw 'Fat Margaret' - the town's main gunning point - and a few nice churches from the outside. After a long day we got home and I was so excited...a hot shower! I don't think I have been so happy at the prospect of 5 days of hot showers! 

As we have seen so much in Tallinn I will shorten it to the highlights...

A walk up the hill on the seaward side gives amazing views over the city. We did this more than once. We went up to the top of St Olaf's church in the wind and rain, which, aside from the amazing view of Tallinn, has a 127m spire which was used by the KGB in the 80s to transmit and receive radio and other broadcasts. The KGB hotel museum is fascinating, proper old school James Bond! They built a hotel which was the only hotel where foreigners where allowed to stay in Estonia, so the KGB could monitor everyone. In the plans for the hotel they left peep holes, spy camera holes, listening devices along with spare rooms and the whole 23rd floor to house the KGB's equipment! When asked why guests weren't allowed to the 23rd floor the KGB replied 'there is no 23rd floor'. 'But we can see it!' 'Don't ask questions!' When this finally didn't work the official line was that... 'The view from the 23rd floor is too good, it would be dangerous!' Wtf! 

A special mention to Tallinn zoo, if you get the chance go there. We weren't expecting much, but they have everything! Polar bears, crocodiles, monkeys, heard of buffalo, lions, tigers, snow leopards and the list continues! Some of the enclosures are top notch and, whilst they are trying really hard and are obviously developing and moving in the right direction, the polar bears are stuck in a communist concrete cage which looks so sad. The polar bear cub was playing in the same bit of water that looked like a sheep dip trying to get a bowling ball out for over an hour!

Now onwards to Helsinki. We booked the first crossing of the day and the last crossing back, leaving us about 12 hours to see it. After a stop at tourist information to make a plan... Everyone needs a plan! ;) we set off. The market place, Uspenski Cathedral (strange prayer going on involving lots of chanting, tried to get involved - awwwwaaaallllliiieee walllowwwaaaaliee), over the lock bridge to Helsinki Cathedral "Rocky steps" (everyone pounded the sky at the top.) Then to an art gallery. After about an hour we realised it was a gallery almost entirely devoted to the lady who drew the Moomims! Apparently she is a big deal here! When we asked the guard 'so we've seen all the rooms up there, tell me, is it all about the Moomims?' With such pride he replied 'yes!' We got our money back. It was interesting though, but not worth £10 each. Once you've seen 50 moomim paintings and sketches they loose their charm, lol. We headed from there to a graveyard which was down as a must see...it was amazing! More of a well looked after park with benches, trees, flowers, bushes and so many interesting graves (artists hill is an area where artists are buried and they all design their own stone, unfortunately no Moomims though). I said to Niki that it's weird that some people here would have been Nazis! We had a little look and saw some of the Nazi decorative crosses on graves but thought we must be making something of nothing, until we came upon a grave with a 3D picture of a soldier in full uniform, heading the stone was two swastikas! 

After the graveyard we headed to the rock church, a church built into the rock and probably one of the most relaxing buildings I have ever been into.

Back to Tallinn and a couple of nice meals, some beers, more site seeing and it was time to say goodbye. I've had a really good week in Tallinn with Niki and was sad to see her leave. But now back to Riga to meet the lads and Dewi's stag do! It's a hard life... 

Stewie