On Monday we caught the bus to the train station at 7am, so we could go to the harbor in Helsinki. To get to the harbor we had to take a trolley bus, which was kind of a novelty, but we didn't know when to get off, so we just followed everyone else. Luckily they were going to the harbor too. We arrived a little too early and the ship was late, which meant that we had to wait around for a couple of hours to get on the boat. The harbor isn't a very nice place either with lots of people getting drunk and pushing to line up. It was a pretty chaotic scene.
Once we were on the boat things were a little better. We got a nice table by the front of the boat, and we had a nice view. Things were pretty interesting on the inside of the boat as well. They had a Finnish tango band, and this one woman was incredibly drunk and dancing all over the place. It was pretty hilarious. She almost crashed into a couple of the other dancers. We also took a look around the duty-free shop, but it was insane in there, so we didn't stay too long. I did buy a couple of candy bars though. I'm sure I saved a lot of import taxes on them.
About 2 and a half hours later we arrived in Tallinn. I'm still amazed by how lack and borderless the E.U. really is. I only used my passport for ID. I never used it to actually get into Estonia.
Once we arrived we went to the cash machine and walked into town. At the ATM a funny thing happened though. A man walked up to us and bewilderedly asked whether or not they use euros in "Estland," which is the name for Estonia in most Germanic languages. After embarrassing myself almost constantly, it was refreshing to witness someone else's utter confusion while traveling.
The walk into the city was pleasant, the weather was mild and it didn't take us absolutely forever to get to the hostel.
Here are some random photos from Monday (5/12) and Tuesday (5/13) in Tallinn:
Medieval Town Hall
Alexander Nevsky Cathedral
On Monday, we went inside St. Olaf's Church, and climbed to the top of the tower. Apparently, the tower was the tallest building in the world during the 16th century, and although it is probably no where close to holding that title any more, I was still pretty scared as I climbed to the top. A 500 year old building with a narrow staircase, and what just seemed like a wooden pole holding it up. They also had signs every couple feet stating "climb tower at your own risk." As I looked out the windows I suddenly started to realize that I'm afraid of heights, yet I continued. Eventually, I reached the top, but it really took a long time, since the staircase was incredibly steep and narrow. Contributing to my fear of heights was the observation deck, which was incredibly narrow. If you look at the photo below, the black part at the top of the tower where the two little spikes are jutting out is where I was standing. I was so scared. It was possible to walk around the whole top of the tower, but I just couldn't do it. I took a couple pictures and then I walked down the stairs as fast as I could to the ground floor. I guess one must suffer for the sake of art (I'll mention this later).
St. Olaf's Church
Later that evening we went out to dinner at an African restaurant, which was appropriately named the African Kitchen. The food was good, but I was a little disappointed that my dish, which had not one, but two, chili peppers next to it wasn't that hot. The next day we went to the Tallinn Photography Museum, which is a cute display inside the old prison, had some coffee, and just enjoyed the beauty of Tallinn some more. In the afternoon we headed to airport and caught a flight to Vilnius!
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