Estonia!

Estonia

After spending a few days in Sweden, we headed to the country of Estonia on a large cruise ship.  The ship sailed through the Archepellago and took us to Tallin, the capital city in Estonia.  We spent most of our time in the Old City where we went on a walking tour, spent time shopping, and ate an authentic medieval lunch.  Some of the highlights were looking at the Harseatic architecture.  The largest cathedral in Tallin was the Aleksan Nevsky Cathedral, which has a golden onion rooftop. 

We ate lunch at Olde Hansa. The menu included herb bread with nuts, crusaders lentil sauce, turnips, barley, and sauerkraut.  One of the highlights was using the unique restroom.  It was quite the “throne.”

After the old town, we toured the KGB museum at the Viru hotel.  The hotel provided the KGB a means to spy on many local and international visitors.  Some of their spy strategies included listening devices in all of the hotel rooms.  Some guests probably figured out what was going on.  One set of guests were complaining that there were not enough towels in their room and suddenly a maid showed up with extra towels.  They also had a secretary whose main job was to sit in the hotel lobby and write down the time each guest left and when they returned.  There was some interesting old school spying going on. 

We also visited the Tallin’s song festival grounds.  Estonians used song to protest the Russian occupation of Estonia in as a non-violent protest.  It was constructed in the 1960s.  It was designed by Alar Kotli, Henno Sepmann, and Uno Tolpus.  In 1991 Estonia became independent from Russia.  At this site they held the singing revolution.  They sang songs that were banned during 

the Russian rule.