Tallinn, Estonia

The second main destination for my trip was Tallinn in Estonia.  For this part of the stay I got myself a Tallinn card.  This gave me access to almost all the museums in Tallinn that you would want to visit, alongside free travel on the public transport, for €45 for three days.  This was a lot better deal than the equivalent card in Riga would have been which had a very limited selection of museums etc (I think I only went to one that was on the card of all the ones that I visited) and only one day of public transport on a three day card!  However, it appears to be little known – people seemed surprised to see someone with a Tallinn card in some of the places I visited – this possibly could have been disappointment as they had to fight with an app on a phone to validate it each time!  However, all worked well, including on the trams and busses I was able to take with it.

Having this card meant that I did visit a large number of museums – even more so than normal!

I started with the collection of art museums in the Kadriorg Park area.  The star attraction is Kumu, the main site of the Art Museum of Estonia.  This is a modern gallery opened just over 10 years ago which houses a collection of more modern art and temporary exhibitions.  It probably was the biggest collection that I have seen on the trip and had some interesting pieces from the time of the Soviet occupation.

Also in the park were the Mikkell Museum, a former collection of a private collector, and the Kadorig Art Museum, which is situated in a baroque palace erected in the 18^th century by Peter the Great.  Now, Peter the Great never got to stay in the palace, but the house in which he did stay when he was in Tallinn is also in the park and is also open to visitors (as it has been for hundreds of years!).  Also in the park is the house of the current President of Estonia.  Unlike other such buildings around the world you can get very close to it (it is not fenced off) with the guard right outside the front door.  As I was there I got to see the changing of the guard – possibly not as impressive as at Buckingham Palace but interesting nevertheless, particularly when they have a spare soldier come with them to adjust their uniform when they are in place!

Back in Tallinn I visited the Estonian Museum of Applied Art and Design.  This had a lot of examples of glassware, book binding, furniture etc packed into a unique display concept.  In a square room they had a square case in the middle which you could walk round both the outside and the inside of, and also round the top to see the rugs etc hung on the wall.  However, as there were low archways in the room the raised walkway had steps down built into it to enable you to get under it.  At my height I was quite cynical about it but it genuinely did work – even for me!  Other art museums visited included the Adamson Eric museum, the Tallinn Art Hall, The Architecture Museum and the Photography Museum.

From a history perspective I visited the Estonian History Museum which is located in the Great Guild Hall.  This was a key building for the guilds in Tallinn historically, and is as interesting as the museum itself.  The museum showed how it had evolved over the years, and how the focus had changed to more Estonian culture after their independence from the USSR.  Other museums visited included the Tallinn City Museum, which told how the city had developed, the Russian museum and the music and theatre museum.  Whilst the museum of the occupation was closed for renovation, there was a free museum which told the story of the people’s front and the development of the independence movement from the USSR.  This included the “Baltic Way” when a human chain was formed across Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia to mark the 50^th anniversary of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact between the USSR and Nazi Germany at the start of World War 2 which divided Eastern Europe into Nazi and Soviet “spheres of influence”.  Pictures and the song composed for it here. 

I also went to the Energy Discovery Centre, a sort of hands on science museum in an old generating station.  This was quite eerie to visit as for a lot of the time I was the only person in it!

The centre of Tallinn is quite historic, with much of the historic town walls and battlements still in place.  This meant that you could get some interesting perspectives, with two separate locations where you could walk on the town walls (and go up the towers that were part of it).  You could also get a tour of the Bastion passages – underground tunnels that were originally part of the defensive fortifications but were later used for air raid shelters and other uses.   At the end of the tunnels was a museum of carved stone.  Two of the largest towers that were part of the defences had their own museums in it – the Kiek in de Kok told the history of the city’s defences and the “Fat Margaret” tower had a maritime museum in it from which you also got access to the roof and the views below.

As ever there were a number of Churches to see, some like St Nicholas’ which had been turned into a museum, the Dome Church, which had a collection of crests and the Holy Spirit Church.  The most impressive was probably the Alexander Nevsky Cathedral which has the look of a typical Russian Cathedral.

One of the things you have to be careful of with a three day card is which attractions are open which day.  This is particularly true for me as one of the days I had the card was a Monday, when the majority of the attractions are closed.  However, there are some open, and so I took a trip a little bit away from the centre to the TV Tower, a Soviet construction which should have views out over Tallinn and beyond.  I say “should”, as the day I went there was another rainy day and the viewing platform at the top was lost in the clouds.  This meant that at times you could see nothing, with occasional glimpses as the clouds parted.  Whilst you didn’t get the views it is just atmospheric being up there in such weather, and there were a number of interesting displays inside, particularly promoting the technology of Estonia (did you know the founders of Skype were from Estonia?).  One quirk that I haven’t seen at such towers before was that they limited your visit to one hour – I don’t know how they would check but it might have caused me some challenges were I going there to watch the sunset as I have at many such towers around the world.  As it was the sun was purely a theoretical concept!

Near the TV tower are the Botanic Gardens.  With the time of year the gardens had mainly gone over so there wasn’t that much to see, which is just as well given the rain.  Down the road was the ruins of the Pirita convent which was an interesting and dramatic sight to see.

Overall, Tallinn was a very impressive place to visit.  It is not “cheap” as might be expected of Eastern Europe (particularly compared to say Prague or Warsaw) but it is certainly reasonable compared to Scandinavia!  The city itself is nice to walk around, with the oldest part of the town on top of the hill but still lots of old buildings and cobbled streets further down within the old city walls leading down to the port.  Like Riga it was far less “Russian” than I might have expected in terms of architecture but Tallinn had probably more historic buildings and different influences.  Well worth visiting – despite the weather!

TV Trouble

As often on this blog a comment to the TV in the locations I have been visiting.  Now, this is going to be a bit tricky on this trip as there were problems with the TV in the hotel rooms in both Riga and Tallinn.  The one point of note/surprise though was that on the main Estonian TV channel they showed English-language programmes in English with no subtitles at relatively peak times in the day.  So, if you were a fan of Midsummer Murders, Foyle’s War or Call the Midwife (to note just those that I came across) you could happily move to Estonia! 

Helsinki, Finland

One of the benefits of my trip to Tallinn was going to be the opportunity to go to Helsinki for the day.  Not only would it let me go to Finland for the first time, it would be significantly less expensive than staying there!

Getting there was straightforward enough.  I got the 8am ferry from Tallinn – a passenger only fast ferry from Linda Line.  This got me in at about 9:40, from which I went via the Old Market Hall to the tourist information office to buy a Helsinki Card.  Now, this cost more for one day than three cost for the equivalent card in Tallinn, but everything costs more in Helsinki, particularly entrance to attractions, hence I went for it.

Having done this the first two attractions I visited were free!  I went to the two cathedrals of Helsinki – Uspenski Cathedral and Helsinki Cathedral.  Of the two, the Uspenski Cathedral was the more ornate, and also had views out over Helsinki from its terrace.

The weather in Helsinki was the coldest I have had it on the trip (I felt like I could have happily had gloves on at some points) and it got wetter as the day went on.  This meant that I saw some of the sites (such as the art deco railway station and the Parliament building) form the outside through the rain!

I did get to use my Helsinki card in visiting three art museums – the Atenium Art Museum (the National Gallery), the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiesma and the HAM Helsinki Art Museum.  I’m not sure that any of these really met their entrance fee compared to some of the other galleries of the world (or even of this trip), particularly as they each had galleries closed for rehanging.  The most interesting was the Atenium as dotted around the collection of works were a number of painting theoretically “on loan” from the “National Gallery of Duckburg” but in reality pastiches of some of the paintings in their collection redone with Donald Duck, Scrooge McDuck etc.  It had a bit of the air of when Banksy took over the Bristol Museum, particularly as the paintings had (very) serious captions/explanations sitting below them.  As I didn’t know this was going on, it was all a bit of a surprise to me, but it certainly added some life to the displays.

My next stop was the National History Museum of Finland, to find out more about the country (which, like every country I have visited on this trip is only around 100 years old having previously been part of Russia and before that Sweden).  However, whilst I was going round I got an e-mail stating that the 19:00 ferry that I was booked on had been cancelled due to bad weather.  Whilst they told me that tickets were valid until end May 2018 that was no help as I needed to be back that day!  The e-mail was quite unhelpful, and the reply to my query made it very clear that they saw it as my problem to sort out another crossing, whatever it cost, they weren’t offering any kind of transfer.  Fortunately I also received a text message from them, also telling me it was cancelled, but adding the additional useful information that there was a 15:00 crossing I could go on.  Whilst this was much earlier than I had planned, I reached the conclusion that I may as well go and get it as it was just about practical to make it and any extended stay in Helsinki would have to be taken up with booking another ferry. 

I made it to the ferry terminal just as boarding was commencing and made it onto the ferry.  It did get a bit choppy as the journey went on (including a wave going over one side of the ferry) so if it was going to get worse maybe it was sensible to cancel the later crossing.  At least I made it back and will be able to get my flight tomorrow!  This did mean that the rest of my to do list for Helsinki had to be abandoned.  I was particularly sad not to get out to the Olympic Stadium, to add to my collection of Olympic Stadia, but given that it (and its viewing tower) were closed for renovation at the moment I probably wouldn’t have seen much, particularly with the rain pouring down!

Riga to Tallinn

Usually on these trips I take the train between the different locations that I visit.  For this trip this wasn’t a practical option – apparently you can get between Riga and Tallinn by train but it takes an age and requires you to change somewhere half way through.  Instead I went by coach, which is something I would usually shy away from as they can be quite confined and lacking in leg room.  However, the coach I went on this time – Lux Express – was a revelation.  I had paid a bit extra for a “lounge” seat, but even the standard seats looked like they had plenty of leg room.  The bus had free tea and coffee facilities (and a loo) and most impressively seat-back TVs that operated just like on a long-distance flight with the ability to watch films.  Whilst my system was slightly fragile (It had a habit of stopping the film every now and again) it did enable me to see two films I hadn’t seen otherwise and while away the time travelling.  Whilst the journey wasn’t quick, neither are American trains and I still go on them, and I expect part of the reason was that the roads weren’t dual carriageways for most of the journey (indeed the journey out of Riga went past almost every tourist attraction I had visited!)

You go past the border controls which used to exist without stopping, but oddly we were stopped for a passport check a few km further down the road!

Overall, far better than I expected – it even arrived early – to be recommended.

Riga, Latvia

For my latest trip I am heading back to Eastern Europe – going to Latvia, Estonia and Finland. 

Riga itself is relatively compact as a capital city, with the majority of sights within walking distance (for normal people – I of course would walk anywhere!).  Whilst there are a large number of museums about, a lot of them are relatively hidden – only a brass plaque would let you know sometimes that there was a museum behind a closed-looking door.  Churches also seemed to be variable in how they opened to visitors – a number were closed when they said they would be open, which means that it was only the Cathedral that I actually got to look around inside.

One of the highlights was the Latvian National Museum of Art which focussed on local Latvian artists.   The building was also interesting – whilst the majority of the galleries were traditional in nature there was an area “in the roof” at the top of the building where there was a white room in amongst the roof struts and another with glass floors down to the gallery below.  If you didn’t fancy stepping on a glass floor you would have found it quite tricky to get around.

Also from an art perspective I visited the Art Museum Riga Bourse (which had older, international art situated in the old stock exchange building), the Museum of Decorative Arts and Design and the Arsenals Exhibition Hall (which had some large landscapes by Vija Zariņa), all of which were part of the National Museum collection.  I also went to the KIM? Contemporary Art Centre, the Porcelain Museum, the Art Academy of Latvia and the Latvian Museum of Architecture.

One of the key events in recent Latvian history is the occupation by the USSR.  This is marked by a number of museums; the Museum of the Occupation of Latvia, the Corner House (which is where the KGB was based) and the 1991 Barricades Museum which protected the independence.  However, Latvia hasn’t been independent for much of its life – whilst there have always been distinct peoples, they only became a country after the first world war.  I learnt more on this at the National History Museum of Latvia and the Latvian War Museum.

I took a trip out to the edge of the city to see an open air museum of Latvian Ethological History.  This has a number of old houses (many wooden, thatched buildings) which were across Latvia which are now in a wide, woodland location by a lake.  This was an unexpected delight, as it was fun to walk through the forest as well as see the buildings, which included some churches and windmills of varying designs.  The rain even stopped for most of the time I was there (but then got me as I walked back to the tram afterwards!)

Yes, it has been a wet trip.  I did take advantage of a pause in the rain to walk over the river to the National Library of Latvia and then onwards to the Botanic Gardens.  The library was really impressive – a large, modern building known as the “Castle of Light”.  You had to get a visitor’s pass to get into the building but it was worth it – there are a number of exhibitions around the different floors and lots of interesting design details.  It was also interesting to walk over some of Riga’s bridges to get there and back!

Overall, Riga was an interesting place to visit – probably not as different as I might have expected – in a lot of ways it was like a provincial German city with a fair selection of historical buildings.  Whilst I feared at one point I might be running out of things to see, in the end I had more than enough places to visit in the three and a half days I was there and there are still a number of places I didn’t get to.  However, must keep going onwards!

 

Venice, Italy

And so for the last stop of my trip to Venice. Nearly as many canals as Birmingham apparently ;)  Certainly they are more obvious here, and a key part of the attraction of coming here.  However, because of the way the city has built up you are much more likely to see them when crossing over a bridge than you are to walk beside one, as a lot of the time buildings are at the canal's edge.  Whilst the main Grand Canal is the most famous, there are hundreds of smaller canals about meaning that going over bridges is a regular occurrence!

To get a sense of the city I first went up the tower in St Mark’s Square.  This took a bit of queuing, partly due to demand but partly as the only way up and down was one lift.  This meant that even at the top there was a big queue for the lift (indeed when I reached the top the queue went almost all the way round the viewing platform, with more people queuing than looking!)  Going up there did help to get a sense of Venice as an “island nation” – some of which were reachable by bridge and others only by boat.   

I had read somewhere that at St Mark's Cathedral had huge queues of many hours for a 10 minute visit.  Fortunately it wasn’t quite like that.  Whilst there was a queue to get in, it did move fairly quickly.  This is just as well as many people got caught out by the “no rucksacks” rule, which was strictly enforced (if you were male anyway, females seem to get away with a lot more!).  Inside it was very impressive, but a slightly odd set-up.  Whilst there was no charge to actually get into the cathedral, there were at least three separate areas that were charged for once you were inside (altar, treasury and museum/balcony).  The other limit was that the place you had to leave your rucksacks had a one hour limit on how long you could leave them there, so there wasn’t time to see everything even if you wanted to pay the money! 

With the main highlight being the cathedral itself you could easily just see that, but I decided to visit the museum whilst I was there.  From the museum you also get a view down onto the church, and also access to the balcony on the front which gives views over St Mark’s Square and the surrounding area.  There was also more to see in the museum than I expected, showing both artefacts and history of the development of the cathedral.

I had considered visiting the Palazzo Ducale next, but the only way in which you could visit it was with a combination ticket for other museums in St Mark's Square or across Venice.  It didn't look too bad in value (considering that Venice itself is more expensive than anywhere else I had been) but I didn't want to spend my whole time in St Mark's Square so I passed on it and went off walking.  I made my way through the side streets, visiting churches where I came across them.  There were two that I found with displays of old musical instruments in time which was interesting (I think they had something to do with each other and were partially there to sell tickets for concerts).  I also saw the offices of the Venice Biennale, which had a small display within it.  There are lots of other art galleries that you can visit in Venice, but the more modern ones that I went past were closed on a Tuesday (which is an unusual day to pick) so this was as close as I got!

The evening had threatened thunderstorms, but fortunately they did not come.  I therefore was able to take a water bus along the Grand Canal at sunset, which was a great thing to so.  having walked to the first stop on the route I had a seat right at the front which meant I got a good view of the buildings and bridges that we passed (actually there are relatively few bridges that cross the canal).  It certainly gave a different view of the city (and was a lot less expensive than a trip on a gondola).  I also seemed to be the expert on using the ticket machine, having to give guidance to two separate couples on them (despite using them for the first time myself).

The next morning I did some more walking around the city, seeing a market of fresh fish and fruit and more interesting side streets.

To leave Venice I had decided to take a water bus to the airport as (a) it was quicker and (b) how often do you get to take a boat to the airport???  However I had this fear at the back of my mind that the boat could be full, and they weren't that frequent (only one every half hour).  Therefore, I planned to take a slightly earlier one and, of the two stops (on different routes) that were closest to my hire (each about 10 minutes walk away) I decided to take the one in the direction of the bus station, just in case...

The fact I am writing this means that my fear came true.  Whilst the half dozen people waiting in front of me in the queue got on, I (and the people behind me) did not.  Even being a single person didn't help!  The boat crew didn't seem to care less!  I therefore had the choice of waiting half an hour, at what time the whole thing could happen again, or a brisk walk to the bus station where I thought I had time to catch the bus (which couldn't really take 75 minutes, could it??).  I decided to take what I thought was the certainly equivalent of the bus.  Turns out that rather than being a direct route to the airport it was a stopping bus that did go round the houses somewhat...  However in the end it took nowhere near 75 minutes, closer to 20 all told, and I arrived at the airport maybe slightly quicker than I would have done if I had gone by boat, including the impact of the walk!