Tallinn, Estonia

Interesting town, Tallinn is. Its old city centre (where I stayed) was not too large at all - you can make the rounds in about two hours if you walk briskly. Being a non party goer, I took the opportunity to sort my thoughts out in the mornings by going out for early walks.

Feeding frenzy thanks to a crazy old woman.

Tallinn is full of sculptures, old buildings, and (what has now become my enemy) cobblestone. Not many people know about this city just because its so small with a population of approximately 400k. Of course, these 400k people are squeezed into an extremely tight area thanks to the proximity of the buildings. What's interesting is that there's a law in the city that prohibits the building of structures which are taller than St. Olaf's church. Even if Tallinn is the up and coming high-tech city, there is a serious lack of skyscrapers which you'd expect of such cities. In total, there are six(!!!) skyscrapers in the city, none of which are allowed to be any taller than 130m.

The medieval structure of the old city has carried through to this day. Numerous courtyards like the one below can be spotted. They are literally everywhere in the old town. This particular

courtyard was interesting: I just felt it was the perfect blend of modern engineering blending right into traditional architecture.

I know I should blur out the license plate..

Should I mention the weather? The sun was out the entire time and the temperatures were so comf.... I can't lie. It was cloudy, raining, windy, and absolutely cold. It seems that my last two trips have been like this. Seeing as St. Petersburg is my next stop, I hope that if it does have to precipitate, that it comes down in the form of snow. At least this way, I can enjoy it! Despite being from such a rainy city myself, I find the rain hard to handle when combined with wind.

I returned to the hostel after an afternoon's worth of photo shooting. At the hostel, I met the most friendly people thus far on my trips in Europe. It literally felt like going to a friend's place to hang out and relax. Heck, we even had a communal dinner made by a young Swiss Farmer! Yes we had to pay, but it was interesting sampling a dish from other cultures. I was going to turn in for the night after such a hearty potato based meal, but I decided to venture out again to capture One Shot (:)) before calling it quits for the day.

The city hall with old town square in none of its usual glory.

Tallinn(2/3/4) should be arriving soon with absolutely no photos. Most of the charm Tallinn had was in the people I interacted with and all the various stories which I heard. :) Nevertheless, more updates to follow!