Day Trip to Tallinn, Estonia

Monday September 29 was a bit cooler but sunny with a high of 11C.  We walked down to the Viking Line dock where we caught the 10:30 a.m. ferry to Tallinn, Estonia.  It is a 2.5 hour trip.  Tallinn is only 80 km (50 miles) south of Helsinki.

Leaving Helsinki harbour-- lots of small islands off the coast

We passed by Suomenlinna, which we visited on Sunday.

Suomenlinna Church in the distance

View of the old submarine from the ferry

Great waterside view of the King's Gate

Very close to the fortifications on Suomenlinna

We headed out on the Baltic Sea.  It was very calm and we saw only a few boats in the distance.  The ferry had good WIFI.  Very pleasant trip.  

The calm Baltic Sea

We docked at Tallinn on-time at 1:00 p.m. Tallinn has a population of about 450,000 and is the capital of Estonia and the country's cultural hub.  

Our Viking Line ferry 

The Port area was very modern.  We decided before heading to the Old Town which was about 20 minutes from the Port, to head to the Rotermanni neighbourhood which housed a number of cafés and restaurants in renovated old warehouses.  We had read about an excellent bakery and café called Rost.

Allan outside of Rost in very cool area (reminded us of the Distillery district)

Coffee and buns baked on the premises

Allan with his coffee.  I had an oat milk macchiato and we shared a delicious cardamon bun.

Great setting and very buzzy spot

As we walked to the Old Town we passed some very modern buildings and sculptures.  I later read that Tallinn is a big high-tech hub and home to the headquarters of the EU's IT agency and home to the NATO Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence.

Very modern buildings

We then reached the Old Town which is one of the best-preserved medieval cities in Europe. It became a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1997.  Tallinn was also the 2011 European Capital of Culture and recipient of the 2023 European Green Capital Award.

The Old Town dates back to the 13th century.  There are two parts:  Toompea Hill, once home to the gentry and Lower Town, a separate political entity.  The Old Town was enclosed by a 2.35 km-long defensive wall, with 1.85 km still standing, including 25 of the original 46 towers.

Tallinn has a centuries long history.  From the latter half of the 20th century until WWII, it thrived as an independent republic.  During WWII, Estonia was first occupied by the Soviet army and annexed into the USSR in the summer of 1940, then occupied by Nazi Germany from 1941-1944.  During the German occupation, Tallinn was aerially bombed by the Soviet air force.  After the German retreat in September 1944, the city was occupied again by the Soviet Union.  In 1991, Estonia became an independent democratic country.   

The Viru Gates- the main entrance into the Old Town-- marked by beautiful twin gate towers,
remnants of a larger gate structure.

Vana Tallin-- map of the Old Town

Flower market

We passed a very interesting piece of bas-relief of Juhan Smuul (1922-1971), an Estonian writer.  It is located on the Writers' Union House.  Smuul was a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Estonia and an active Marxist-Lenninist.  There is a small plaque beside the larger memorial plague which reads "Guilt and complicity, the dark side of Juhan Smuul's story".  This relates to his role as a recorder of deportees' property during the 1949 Soviet mass deportation, a fact revealed by archival proof in 2023.  This revelation led to a public debate and a vote by the Writers' Union to keep the bas-relief, but to install an additional plaque below the large piece noting his complicity.

Lower plaque added to the bas-relief

We also passed  a statue of Jaan Kross (1920-2007), an Estonian writer who won the 1995 International Nonino Prize in Italy.  He graduated from the University of Tartu School of Law and taught there as a lecturer until 1946.  In 1944, he was arrested by the Nazis for six months, suspected of promoting Estonian independence.  He was arrested by the Soviets in January 1946 and then deported to a Gulag in Northern Russia for eight years.  Kross returned to Estonia in 1954 and became a writer.  In 1992, he helped draft Estonia's new constitution after the country gained independence from the Soviet Union. He was nominated several times for the Nobel Prize in Literature during the early 1990s.  The statue of Jaan Kross was unveiled in February 2022 at an intersection which faces the author's former house. 

Jaan Kross (1920-2007)

We passed by another intriguing relic of medieval daily life: the Cat's Well, where locals threw down animal sacrifices to ensure the city's wells never ran dry.  They never did run dry, but the practice of throwing animals down the well did little for water quality and by the mid-19th century, the Cat's Well had fallen into disuse.

Cat's Well

More medieval buildings- beautifully preserved

Late Gothic dwelling, an architectural monument under national protection.  The stone building was first mentioned in 1373, obtained its present dimensions in the 15th century and was rebuilt in the 17th centred.

Michel Sittow (1469-1525) court artisan to Isabella of Castile, inherited his father's, the artist Clawes van der Sittow's, house where he lived until his death.

We continued our walk through part of Old Town and then headed over to the Telliskivi Creative City neighbourhood.  First stop was the Balti Jaam Market,  a renovated market hall on three levels, which has a large number of food stores, cafés and other shops.

Outside of the Balti Jaam Market

Huge fish store

We then headed into an area of Telliskivi with a lot of shops and restaurants in old warehouses along with many buildings with graffiti.

Warehouse area with shops and restaurants

Large concept store with some very neat 3D rings made by an Estonian artist (I got one).

Very funky area with lots of graffiti and sculptures mixed in among green space

 and building with graffiti

We stopped in at the gift shop of Fotografiska, Tallin.  We have visited the wonderful Fotografiska museums in Stockholm and New York, though the latter shut down a few years ago.  Fotografiska was founded in Stockholm in 2010, and is a contemporary museum of photography, art and culture with eclectic programming and dining.  There are Fotografsika museums in Berlin and Shanghai in addition to Stockholm and Tallinn.  One will be opening in Oslo in 2027.

Approaching Fotografiska

Outside of Fotografiska Tallinn.  

Lots of cool graffiti in Telliskivi

Heading back to the old town-- "Caffeine" kiosk

We hurried back through the Old Town and got to the Port just before boarding closed.  One has to board the ferry 20 minutes before departure time, which was 5:00 p.m.

Porto Franco--- lots of new development near the port area

The ferry arrived in Helsinki on time at 7:30 p.m.   We headed back to the apartment.  

It was a whirlwind trip to a very interesting city.  While Tallinn has strong links with the Nordic countries, especially Finland, it has a fascinating centuries-long history and is very unique.  The mix of the medieval city, the renovated warehouse areas and the very new parts of the city provide a lot of variety. We were really glad we paid a visit.  It had a great vibe.

Allan made a light dinner of gravlax, eggs and more delicious mushrooms, herring and a green salad. We had some chocolate and shared a cardamon bun for dessert.  Tuesday September 30 is our last full day in Helsinki.  On October 1, we head to Athens for the beginning of our Greek adventure.