On Saturday, I signed up for a tour around the Lahemaa National Park in Estonia through my hostel. I went out for a run in the morning and it was beautiful. I congratulated myself on my forethought to choose this day to go out traipsing through a swamp and to the beach and so on. My group was set to load up a van at 11am to leave, and at 10:59am it started to pour. Great. I had my raincoat packed, though, just in case, and we braved the cats-and-dogs weather.
We drove for a little while through the outskirts of Tallinn, talking with Richard, our tour guide, and getting to know the other 7 people on the tour. Oddly, there was a group of 5 Canadian school teachers who had only just met one another because they happened to all sign up for some tour package through the Baltics and had been thrown together to travel for the past 8 days. It was just a weird Canadian coincidence that they were all teachers.
Our first stop on the tour (it was our second stop overall because everyone was hungry and asked to stop at a convenience market to buy some snacks) was the Jagala Waterfall. I was expecting something really grand because this is supposed to be the largest waterfall in Estonia. They call it the "Niagra Falls of the Baltics" for crying out loud. This is it:
In asking about the falls, I did learn that they're usually much larger, but that there's been some drought conditions lately and that it's always biggest in the spring with the snowmelt. Mostly, though, the tides make the biggest difference in the size of the waterfall. We showed up at low tide, so the falls were small. Had we been there later or earlier, at high tide, the whole shelf would have been falls, not just the little part we saw. Weird, right?
Our next stop was an old manor house that had belonged to one of the ruling German royals during the 17th century. It hasn't been inhabited for a long time and is falling into disrepair, but can be yours for the low, low price of 1 million euros! (Our tour guide estimated it would be another 3-4 million euros to renovate the place and bring it up to being habitable again.) Also, it's apparently a haunted manor house. The ghosts get thrown in for free!
After the manor house, the weather started to clear and we were able to go through with our hike through the big swamp. Lahemaa is right near the Baltic Sea and has lots of marshland and swamps and bogs (is there a difference between those three things? I don't know, but I like all three words). There's a narrow single track walkway to help tourists make it through the swamp without ruining their shoes. It was really beautiful.
After all the walking and talking we'd been doing, we were all hungry (even those who stopped for food at the convenience store). We stopped at a traditional Estonian roadside tavern and ate some delicious food.
Last of all, we headed out to the beach. It was a breathtaking spot. The mainland winds out to a little spit that becomes an island during high tide, but has a narrow path you can follow out to the end during low tide. Our tour guide said he used to start this tour with this beach and would walk out with his groups to the end of the spit, but that after he got two tours stranded out there during the tide change his bosses won't let him take people out to the island any more. He said it's really silly because you can actually walk back, as long as you take off your shoes and don't mind getting wet up to your thighs. We just looked out at the island, though, and didn't risk the walk.
I came back into a dried-off Tallinn, and after resting for a little bit, took off wandering the city some more. I spent the evening in the common room at the hostel, talking with a Dutch girl, an American girl, 4 Norwegians, and a Portuguese man. The Norwegians decided quickly that Norway is the best country in the world because they've got the best drinking songs. They then proceeded to sing all of their drinking songs to us, punctuating their cheers with chugs. I ran into the group again in the morning, as I was getting ready to go out for a run and they were coming back from the bars. I think I liked my variant better than theirs.
We drove for a little while through the outskirts of Tallinn, talking with Richard, our tour guide, and getting to know the other 7 people on the tour. Oddly, there was a group of 5 Canadian school teachers who had only just met one another because they happened to all sign up for some tour package through the Baltics and had been thrown together to travel for the past 8 days. It was just a weird Canadian coincidence that they were all teachers.
Our first stop on the tour (it was our second stop overall because everyone was hungry and asked to stop at a convenience market to buy some snacks) was the Jagala Waterfall. I was expecting something really grand because this is supposed to be the largest waterfall in Estonia. They call it the "Niagra Falls of the Baltics" for crying out loud. This is it:
A HUGE Waterfall, right?
Well, not too huge. Kinda not so big at all, in fact.
But it's taller than me, so it wins!
In asking about the falls, I did learn that they're usually much larger, but that there's been some drought conditions lately and that it's always biggest in the spring with the snowmelt. Mostly, though, the tides make the biggest difference in the size of the waterfall. We showed up at low tide, so the falls were small. Had we been there later or earlier, at high tide, the whole shelf would have been falls, not just the little part we saw. Weird, right?
Our next stop was an old manor house that had belonged to one of the ruling German royals during the 17th century. It hasn't been inhabited for a long time and is falling into disrepair, but can be yours for the low, low price of 1 million euros! (Our tour guide estimated it would be another 3-4 million euros to renovate the place and bring it up to being habitable again.) Also, it's apparently a haunted manor house. The ghosts get thrown in for free!
Some local kids in the art school made ghosts and put them inside the manor house windows. Since no one really owns it right now, no one has cared to move them out.
After the manor house, the weather started to clear and we were able to go through with our hike through the big swamp. Lahemaa is right near the Baltic Sea and has lots of marshland and swamps and bogs (is there a difference between those three things? I don't know, but I like all three words). There's a narrow single track walkway to help tourists make it through the swamp without ruining their shoes. It was really beautiful.
Heading into a quagmire
There were some pretty pools throughout the swamp
They built a big watchtower in the center of the swamp so you can see further
It was an odd landscape, and strangely beautiful
There is one big pool that's really deep near the end of the swamp, and locals all go swimming there. The water seemed clean, but was really dark. It was still too cold for any of us to jump in.
After all the walking and talking we'd been doing, we were all hungry (even those who stopped for food at the convenience store). We stopped at a traditional Estonian roadside tavern and ate some delicious food.
Estonian Cracker Barrel?
After lunch we drove by a renovated manor house. This one charges a hefty admission fee, though, so we contented ourselves with some clandestine photos from outside the gates and skipped the tour.
Last of all, we headed out to the beach. It was a breathtaking spot. The mainland winds out to a little spit that becomes an island during high tide, but has a narrow path you can follow out to the end during low tide. Our tour guide said he used to start this tour with this beach and would walk out with his groups to the end of the spit, but that after he got two tours stranded out there during the tide change his bosses won't let him take people out to the island any more. He said it's really silly because you can actually walk back, as long as you take off your shoes and don't mind getting wet up to your thighs. We just looked out at the island, though, and didn't risk the walk.
You can see the island in this picture: the little stand of trees in the back left
Apparently the big rocks are boulders deposited by glaciers at the end of the last ice age
I don't know what I was doing here, but one of the Canadian teachers took this picture for me
I came back into a dried-off Tallinn, and after resting for a little bit, took off wandering the city some more. I spent the evening in the common room at the hostel, talking with a Dutch girl, an American girl, 4 Norwegians, and a Portuguese man. The Norwegians decided quickly that Norway is the best country in the world because they've got the best drinking songs. They then proceeded to sing all of their drinking songs to us, punctuating their cheers with chugs. I ran into the group again in the morning, as I was getting ready to go out for a run and they were coming back from the bars. I think I liked my variant better than theirs.
My hostel was just on the corner on the right, smack-dab in the middle of the old town. Pretty decent location, I think.
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