On May 22nd I boarded a ferry from Helsinki to Tallinn, Estonia, to properly begin my journey over land (and sea) from my point of origin.
Estonia is another incredible and fairly unknown country to many. It has a deeper history than Finland in that it is located on the European mainland and traded hands through various empires over the centuries, including being a principal Baltic trading hub for the Danish, Teutonic Knights, Livonia, Hanseatic League, Swedes, and Russians before eventually establishing its own independence first between 1920 – 1940 and again in 1991.
Google the Singing Revolution of 1988, in which nearly a quarter of a million Estonians (~25% of its total population) gathered in the Tallinn Song Festival Grounds to sing patriotic songs banned under Soviet rule, as well as the The Baltic Way in 1989, in which two million Estonians, Latvians, and Lithuanians, formed a 370 mile human chain across all three Baltic nations in mass peaceful protest against their occupation and you will be humbled by the capacity of human organization and perseverance in the pursuit of freedom and preservation of national identity to successfully overcome overwhelming superpower might.
Tallinn has one of the most well-preserved medieval city centers in the world as it evaded significant bombing during the world wars. Parts of its still standing city wall date back nearly 1,000 years ago. The St. Olaf church was even deemed the tallest building in the world between 1549 – 1625. One can spend days exploring its narrow passages, museums, and plazas. One my favorite paintings of all time, in fact, is the 15th century Danse Macabre (The Dance of Death) by Bernt Notke located in the St. Nicholas church. It depicts alternating figures of medieval hierarchical society, from priests and royalty down to peasants, paired with mocking skeletons interlaced in between, denoting of course the theme that no matter the social status and success one obtains in their earthly existence, all human beings are made equal in the end as no one evades the specter of their own mortality.
I first visited Estonia in the fall of 2003, prior to its joining the European Union when it was still shaking its Soviet legacy and arguable mismanagement, and have probably visited at least a dozen times by now. It is now considered one of the most digitally advanced and integrated countries in the world. Two of my close friends from the Ida crew, Kari and Eero, were born there in Soviet times with the former moving to Finland with his family upon the fall of the Soviet Union in the 1991 and the latter having returned to reside in Tallinn ever since graduating from the Helsinki School of Economics in Finland.
Eero met me at the harbor, and we ate lunch with his wife Emily (also a friend from university in Finland) at their home in Tallinn. They have three teenagers whom I have met before but they were all in school during my brief visit. Eero is a enthusiastic personality and employs the term “simply marvelous” better than anyone I have ever heard speak before. Every time I visit he can be trusted to show me the most quirky and unique sides of Estonia beyond its medieval history.
Past trips have featured him guiding me around an abandoned Soviet airbase in 2009 where we found our way onto the premises through a hole in the decrepit perimeter fence; a fascinating tour of the Soviet-era Rummu prison complex-turned-summertime-swimming-destination after the forced labor open pit mine filled with crystalline ground water years after the prisons were shut; and of course an epic 2006 Midsummer’s trip to the southern tip of Saaremaa (the largest island in the Baltic) with our whole Ida crew (see prior post), which ominously began with us striking deer on two separate occasions thirty minutes apart while driving to the ferry terminal at the early hours of dawn. Fortunately, we shook the initial dire omens and memorialized a quintessential summer time trip for the ages.
As a well-connected, serial entrepreneur he is always cooking up various business ventures. He was one of the first to import electric vehicles into Estonia and also served as an economic advisor to an Estonian Finance minister soon after graduating university. This time we drove two hours south to the city of Parnu located on the Gulf of Riga, Estonia’s self-dominated Summer Capital. He had acquired an idle property there through an asset liquidation process several years prior and was lining up some meetings to consider options to further its rehabilitation for improved cash flow. He assured me it was perfectly suitable for accommodation during our stay.
Having never been, I was game to see a new town, although we arrived a couple weeks prior to the onset of its summer peak season. Despite its calm demeanor, I enjoyed taking a walk onto its beach and delighted in its tree-lined streets and well-manicured parks. Most peculiarly, the town features elephants throughout, whether in the form of graffiti, vegetative hedges, or giant slides sited in the ocean. Apparently, its origins date back to a medieval gatehouse being referred to as an “Elephant barn” due to its unique architecture, and a subsequent traveling circus in 1936 that brought five live elephants to the town galvanized the ongoing amusement of the populace with the creatures. In the 1950s the first Elephant slide appeared on the resort beach and the town has fully adopted the iconic creature as part of its playful and happy motto as a vacation destination ever since.
We enjoyed some exceptionally tasty savory pancakes loaded with salmon, capers, fish eggs, and sour cream, prior to a night of low-level bar hopping and socializing with locals. The following morning we bid farewell after breakfast as I continued on my way by bus to Vilnius, Lithuania.
I absolutely enjoy my every visit to Estonia, but a primary basis for this Journey to Nowhere in Particular is to prioritize allotted time to destinations beyond the reach of traditional PTO vacation limits, and as such, the first 1.5 months of my travels through eastern Europe will lamentably be pursued with a haste I traditionally find ill-advised but am employing given both prior familiarity and ability to return more readily to.
Onward.
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