Tag: Tallin

About Tallinn..

As with Latvia, the recent modern history of Estonia has been brutal. In 1870 the Baltic railway officially opened, leading to an economic boom through rapid industrial growth, with tracks into Russian. By the early 1900’s there was a major revolution across the Russian empire against limited political freedom & awful working conditions. Although this was quelled by Russia, it laid the ground work for the freedom movement & eventually in 1918 Estonia became independent, with Tallinn becoming the capital.

In 1940, the USSR occupied Estonia, however this didn’t last long as the Germans took over from 1941-1944 throughout the second world war. By 1944 the Soviet forces re-took Estonia where they would remain for almost 50 years. Interestingly Tallinn hosted some sailing events from the 1980 Moscow summer Olympics. Leading up to 1991 there were many protests against the Soviet occupiers & in 1991 Estonia regained it’s independence. They have been building ever since, the capital is truly stunning. The people are the most welcoming & friendly I have ever had the good fortune to meet. Although, if I do have any beef with Estonia, it’s that Skype was invented there & I still have nightmares of the pinging sound at work every 2 minutes 😂

Some photos of the trip… 🤳🏼

Story time 📚

Whilst I was wandering around the old town, mesmerised by the architecture & beauty of it, I stumbled upon a Scottish bar. My initial premonition was that it would be similar to when you see an Irish bar abroad, Irish in name only. I had a jam packed itinerary the next day so wasn’t planning on indulging in any beers, however stumbling upon this hidden gem was surely a sign? It is called Highlander Scottish pub & it is actually really cool, well worth checking out. As is standard practice, I was wearing my kilt, leading to the staff throwing free drinks at me. Subsequently it was not a quiet night, leading me onto a magical mystery tour of an evening.

I ended up meeting a gent from the Estonian Eurovision band, I have since listened to their song & it is very catchy. If you search for 5MIINUST x Puuluup on YouTube, you will find it. No idea what the song is about , but the guy & his Finnish friends were lovely people. After a few beers I was feeling a boogie down the discos, so went off into another bar & ended up meeting the Estonian rugby team (didn’t even know they had rugby there 😂). It ended up being a 3am karaoke bar job, sightseeing was a struggle in the morning! The Estonian people really made this trip special & I hope to see them again some day soon.

Just outside of the city there is a place called the Estonian open air museum & it is a wonderful hidden gem. I highly recommend a visit there & they have an old cafe inside the grounds. I am incredibly blessed & humble to have seen a few countries around the world & I will always try to find some local food recipes or dishes. One of the rugby lads had advised against this for Estonian food, I wish I had taken his advice. In the cafe they had a dish called Mulgipuder, I am glad I tried it, but it was absolutely savage, on par with Scotland’s level of culinary expertise. The server was a lovely lady & came to ask me what I thought of it, I didn’t have the heart to say, so just told her it was great & I would be having more before leaving Estonia. Sadly however, a full stomach is never guaranteed for a lot of people around the world, so I always finish my food with gratitude. Although, I certainly won’t be in a hurry to get it again, finishing it was a tough effort!

Useful tourist site information & costs🧑🏼‍🎓

The cost of visiting a couple of tourist sites & paying individually adds up really quickly, especially as there are so many places to see. I would highly recommend buying the Tallinn card, you can get it online or buy it from the tourist information centre which is right in the heart of Old town. The Tourist centre is better than online, as they hand out booklets with all of the sites you can visit, but when I checked online it did not have as many places as the booklet. (As of September ’25) It cost 43Euros of for 24 hours, 63Euros for 48 hours & 76Euros for 72 hours. Whilst that may sound expensive, some of the sites are almost 20Euros individually.

You can maximise the value of the card if you plan ahead. A decent strategy if you only want to pay for one day, is to buy it around 12/1pm, spend the whole afternoon / evening going round as many of the sites in Old town as you can & then getting up early the next day to visit a couple of places. Then if you pick one of the big attractions last, as long as you are in before the 24 hours elapses, you still get to stay in. You can do the Seaplane Harbour museum, Open air museum & Zoo this way as they are all within relatively close distance to each other.

I did not visit every place on the card, however places that you definitely should visit are the 3 mentioned above. All included in the card & worth seeing are the KGB holding Cells, Estonian Maritime Museum (Different from Seaplane), Bastion Passages, St Olav’s Church observation platform, Kiek in de kok fortifications & the Estonian History Museum – Great Guild Hall. There are several Holy buildings worth stopping by as they are really beautiful but also have high towers where you get great views of the town. They are Church of the Holy spirit, The Cathedral of Saint Mary the Virgin & the Bell Tower, Niguliste Museum & Viewing Platform