TALLINN February 3, 2007

TALLINN Saturday February 3, 2007

Well, another busy day today. We both slept well but we were awake early as we were in bed about 20h30. Rab was feeing better, thank goodness, and we had a very pleasant breakfast although again we were alone, ll the other guests apparently lying in,  There is a good selection of food, including cold meat, cheese and fish – Baltic herring and smoked salmon – and good dark rye bread. A solid start to the day.

T at town gates

We caught the tram (quite old hands at this now) down to the start  point fo the city tours and arrived there at the same time as the first bus of the day. By chance it was the same driver as yesterday although we were taking a different route – mainly through the Old Town and City Centre. It was good value although the background music between the spoken commentary was a bit dreary.

We decided to catch the next tour bus to the stop at the top of the Old Town to an area known as Toompea from which there were panoramic views over the roofs of the buildings below. We had a little over an hour to kill, so changed some money into Lats for tomorrow and bought Rab a pair of warmer gloves at the Viru Centre. Although the temperature was + 2C again, there was at  times a biting  wind blowing and we certainly felt that. A bit of light snow fell last night but it was all gone today.

The views from up in Toompea were indeed tremendous and even though a good deal of snow had gone there was enough to make the place look spectacular. We walked around the top of the plateau until we were above our hotel and then descended the hundreds of steps to ground level. We grabbed a somewhat ordinary hot dog for lunch and  some cheese and biscuits for tomorrow (we have no idea what will be available during the five hour trip) and then headed back to the hotel for a rest and to warm up a bit.

Rab was captivated by the sales in most of the shops. Clothes and boots are pretty reasonable to start with, but with discounts of 40% - 70% they are bargains. She had started looking around Viru for a longer warm coat with no success and after chatting to the receptionist here she decided to head for another shopping centre. This was a little way out of town so we had our first ride on a trolley bus. It had very dirty windows, flew like the wind and took an unexpected route, confusing us somewhat. I asked directions from the only bloke we found who spoke a little English. He looked a bit like the albino in the Da Vinci Code but his looks belied him and he was very helpful in guiding us to the Katherine Centre. Not that it did Rab much good in her search because she found nothing in her size. But if she had been successful she might have got a coat for under A$50.

We paused for a drink and both felt like something cold, like an iced coffee or even a spider, but couldn’t get the servitor to understand and finally settled for a Kiss – a local pear cider that was very pleasant; so we had a second. It was not very high alcohol content – 4.5 – but it did come in half litre cans at A$3.50 a can. The booze is quite cheap by Australian or British standards so it is understandable why flocks of young Poms fly in for parties – plenty of strip clubs too.

A view of our hotel - right foreground

We caught another trolley bus back to Viru and walked from there back through the Old Town for the last time, heading for the restaurant Lars recommended so very highly – Le Chateau which he was adamant we must visit. I would rather have had the Estonian meal we were planning to have last night but we felt we should placate Lars. Big mistake! The place was quite a distance from our normal hants and we missed it initially, so had to re-trace our steps. There was nothing in the relatively pricey menu that really appealed so Rab settled for a salmon dish and I had the stew. Mine was pretty tasty but difficult to eat and Rab’s was just not good, especially as they forgot to bring her veggies. All up it only cost A$33 but………