The main reason for this blog post, though, is to tell about our 4 day vacation to Tallinn, Estonia & Riga, Latvia. If you don't know where those places are, here:
So, Vilnius is in the South Eastern part of Lithuania. And Riga and Tallinn are both on the Western coasts of Latvia and Estonia. Right on the Baltic Sea. This post will be about Tallinn. Get ready, because this was definitely the best experience of my life, so far.
We got on a bus Thursday night at 10:30 PM. We found a very cheap coach site. Our bus ride to Tallinn round trip was $65. So this bus ride was 8 1/2 hours long. Thankfully, it was through the night, so we were able to get some sleep. I got the whole back seat of the bus to myself. That's 5 seats!! Well, until another teacher came and took half of it. But you better believe that I sprawled out like a sleepy baby :D So we arrived in Tallinn at 7:00 AM on Friday and walked about a mile to our Hostel. At first, Tallinn looked pretty similar to Vilnius. It was SO cold, though! Like it immediately dropped 30 degrees or something. Sheesh! We got to our hostel and it was pretty freaking awesome. My first hostel experience! It was called "The Monk's Bunk."
Sadly, this is the only photo of it that I have, but it was the swankiest, most chill place ever! It had a bunch of couches, a pool table, a huge painted map of Estonia on the wall, and a huge picture wall of past visitors. It had a movie room, a huge kitchen, and very nice bed rooms! The receptionist was from Colorado, haha. So that was refreshing to meet an American native, for the first time in a while. We were in a 10 bed mixed dorm, so after us 5 girls took up half of it, we ended up staying with a German guy named Felix, a Japanese guy, a Slovenian named Nates, a Ukranian, and then some other guy who was all of a sudden just there. Hahaha. We became good acquaintances with Nates and Felix. They are both just backpackers, taking time off school and such. They were really amazing people! We had good discussions about books and movies and life.
So we dropped off our bags and took off to discover Tallinn. Tallinn is known to have the best Old Town in all of Europe. And there is no way you can deny it. It's literally the most beautiful city I have ever seen. Even in photos on Pinterest of Venice and London and such. It beats by 1,000. You're immediately engulfed in winding, cobblestone streets, uneven red roofs, and the most exquisite cafes and bakeries. We stopped at a cafe called Reval Cafe, and it immediately was like a Starbucks. But better, obviously.
We had hot chocolate (the best I've ever had) to warm ourselves up from the cold. There was something about that moment. Drinking this delicate hot chocolate, staring through the windows at Tallinn, at this sweet, little cafe in Europe. It was bliss, really.
We wandered so much that first day. We found many antique shops, cafes, souvenir shops, Cathedrals. We met a really neat guy at an antique shop. He was talking to us about how he's never owned a cell phone or electronic device. Not even a watch! He just owns this little antique shop, not to make money, but to meet people. That's what he told us! I absolutely adored that! By the way, everyone in Tallinn knows english. Yes, they speak Estonian. But it was very simple to communicate there. I have no idea why? But everyone speaks it! I liked that :) It was comforting. We ate lunch at an Italian restaurant called Vapiano. It was so open and fresh looking! They give you a card and you go up to either the pizza, pasta or salad window. You choose an option, they swipe your card and you go sit down and they make everything fresh right there. Even the pizza dough. It took a while, but it was so worth it. I loved how fresh it was! I got a friggin' huge Caesar salad and a Salami pizza. Both gigantic. But delicious. And I finished every bite, obviously.
I don't know how I've lost weight here. But I most certainly have. Though I eat like this often :p
Next we explored this really really fancy mall. It had nice shops and lots of cool little cafes and chocolate shops! I want everything. Even after this huge meal I wanted a cake and a pie and pastries. Ugh. I have a food problem, we all know. Estonia was torture because I've NEVER seen food like they have in Estonia. So perfect. After that, we went to a little carnival they had. We rode a ferris wheel, which costed 5 euros. We though it was expensive, but after we went around about 20 times, we realized it was worth the money. It gave us a breath-taking view of Tallinn AND the Baltic SEA!! We didn't even realize how close we were to the sea until we saw it on the Ferris Wheel! It was a lovely surprise :) The guy operating the Ferris Wheel was a super creep and was just in LOVE with Kelby. But he was nice, nonetheless.
This is us completely freaking out about the sights on the ferris wheel! Prepare for little girl shrieks!
When we got off the ferris wheel, we headed straight to the sea. It was nice to just sit, hang out feet off the boardwalk, and just soak in the sun.
A cool graffiti wall we found on the boardwalk.
After a bit more sight-seeing, we headed back to the hostel. We sat in the common room, hooking up to the wifi for a bit and a nice Greek man starts talking to us. He was in Tallinn doing an internship. We played a few rounds of black jack with him and then our roommate, Nates, came and joined in! It was so much fun getting to know them. That is the best thing about hostels...you meet so many people from around the world. It's invigorating. As we were playing cards, I kept eyeing this guy who was playing pool with his buddies across the room. He was super handsome and was wearing salmon colored pants. How could I resist, right? Hahah. Joke. But anyway, I couldn't help but keep glancing up at him while they were playing. They seemed to be having a lot of fun by how much they were laughing and stuff! Then I realized they were all just drunk :p Well, after the card game, Kelby, Hayden & I were hungry so we left to get a quick bite at Hesburger. When we got back, all of the pool boys were sitting down around the table playing cards with Jenna & Joni! I was so stoked! They asked if we wanted to join, so we took it to the bigger table in the kitchen. They taught us a game called "Presidents and Assholes" which was pretty similar to Scum. hahah. Oh, and they were from Australia! GAH! Their accents were B-E-A-UTIFUL. I was sitting next to a big teddy bear guy named Baaz? And the handsome one was named Hobs, and the 2 others were named Jonny and Jonn-ay! hahaha. It was really fun playing with them. They kept offering us beers, but obviously we didn't take any. After the game, we told them we were mormons and they were all stunned. Like, jaw-dropped stunned. A couple of them even said they have never even met a mormon ever in their lives! It was pretty crazy. They thought we all lived under rocks and went around handing out pamphlets and flowers to people. So, it was kind of cool to show them that we're not like that.
Baaz and I.
From left to right: Hobs, Joni, Hayden, Kelby, myself, Baaz. And in the front: Jenna & Jonn-ay. Jonny isn't in the photo for some reason. Disclaimer to any ILP people reading this: We weren't drinking those beers. Those belonged to the Australians.
After a few rounds we went to bed. I slept sooo dang good in that hostel bed. In the morning we went back to Reval cafe and got more hot chocolate, but this time I added a raspberry, granola parfait and a apple pastry. Gosh, even their parfaits are better. I swear, every ingredient they use is top grade. So everything just TASTES better no matter what. I even had a meat pastry at one point and it was divine! It was like a flaky croissant and inside was this seasoned ground beef that tasted just like a pot pie! mmMMM :) We found a HUGE cathedral called the Alexander Nevsky cathedral. It was by far the most beautiful building I have yet to see in Europe.
For the rest of the day, we explored some more, found a really neat exotic goods store, where everything they had was home-made and imported from all over the world! They had an instruments section which took me straight to heaven. They had the neatest banjo I have EVER seen. Tons of didgeridoos, rain sticks, drums, tambourines, flutes, etc. I bought a couple of souvenirs there. Not too expensive either! We went to Subway for lunch (Halle-frickin-lujah) it was amazing. And McDonald's for dinner. We decided to try and eat cheaper that day, so we resulted to american food. Even though, honestly, it's not much cheaper. It's about the same! But hey, the american food in Europe does taste better than in America. Ironically :p I got some roasted almonds that smelled like Christmas and gingerbread but tasted like fire! I could only eat a few before my throat was burning. Sadly :/ I just wanted some simple cinnamon almonds. We went to St. Olav's cathedral, which used to be the tallest building in the world at one point, and climbed up about a zillion stairs in a stone passageway. We reached the top and were treated to a 360 degree view of Tallinn. Pictures can't do it justice, but look anyway!
It's hard to show in pictures because there is a feeling that comes with it. A feeling that cannot be captured. So you need to experience it for yourself. Go to Tallinn. Trust me, you will never regret it. Skip Italy, skip England. Go to Tallinn <3
We headed back to the hostel and played a few rounds of pool with the Australians. Baaz & I against Jenna & Hobs. Hobs was obviously torturing me with his good looks. hahah :) But we won after he shot in an 8-ball in the wrong hole. So that was fun! They were very heavy drinkers. Pretty much going around Europe just to drink. They were headed to Oktoberfest next so that should tell you enough. But they were still pretty great. Baaz & Jonny were douches, but Jonnay & Hobs were sweethearts. Hobs and I talked a lot and had some good discussions. He showed me photos of his dog that he misses a lot and I talked to him about the teaching and things like that. We became facebook friends and made plans to meet again someday. I just love that :) Making friends in a foreign place and making plans to meet again in the future. Nothing tops it.
No comments:
Post a Comment