Tallinn, Estonia

 Uneventful trip from Parnu to Tallinn.  No buses missed.  I managed to get my bag out of storage.  

I gotta be honest, I do not remember the city of Tallinn.  I think I spent a few days there?  I remember some stuff I did but not what order.  Again, to the photos...

I literally had to check my hotel dates.  I arrived the evening of the 6th.  Had a tour booked for the 7th.  And then left super early on the 8th.  

My hotel was near this old looking gate.  No time for a walking tour so no idea of the history of the place. 

My tour the next morning was into the Lahemaa National Park.  We met at 10 am at the Chimney Sweep statue.  

There were just three of us on the tour so we were just in the guide's car.  He was the company owner and had a bit of a chip on his shoulder whenever I said 'tour guide'.  He is not a tour guide, he is the owner, despite the fact that he is guiding us on this tour. Sure, whatever.  He knew a lot about Estonia.  

Estonia is very nice.  I looked at house prices in a realtor's window while I was in Parnu.  We can all buy a nice little bungalow for @ 400K CAN.  But I think we would have to learn Estonian so that is a drawback to this plan.  The country is basically empty.  Tallinn is a real city, from what I saw of it, but the rest of the country is sparsely populated.  

Anyway, back to our tour with our not-a-tour-guide.  First stop, one of the 'most beautiful waterfalls in the world'.  Having been in Iceland for a few days now, the land of the waterfall, this would not even crack the top 100 here but it was nice. And it was a nice little hike down to the bottom.  Good start to the day.

We arrived at the park.  It looked a lot like the park I went to in Latvia.  There was even a big walk.  

The barn swallow is the national bird of Estonia.

They are very proud of their rocks that were deposited all over by the glaciers during the ice age.  They were pretty cool.

That's a big rock!

Another town (or many) inside of a park. And a beach.

Included in the tour was lunch. Some pickled fish, homemade bread and some of the best soup I have ever eaten.  Pumpkin soup with crazy delicious toppings like bacon, pickled onion, mushrooms and more that I can't remember.

Then more park. There was lots of little hikes through the forest so it was really a lovely day walking in nature.

This was the beaver pond trail hike.  
No beavers :(

Three old fishing cabins sort of preserved.

At some point, I asked our not-a-tour-guide what the Balkan people are called.  Like people in North America are North Americans.  That led to a 20 minute lecture on how Estonia is not part of the Balkans, it is part of Scandinavia since they are much closer culturally and linguistically to Finland.  So, I never got an answer to my question.  So, I just started saying Balticians.  

Anyway, back to the park. 

This is what they consider a beaver dam in Estonia.  Bah.  

I am going to stop here because I am tired and we are having 'roommate drama' so I have to go protect my bed.   This is kind of short but I don't want to wait to post something.  I will do Helsinki as soon as I can.