| | Sep 1, 2009 - Tallinn, Estonia | (click to enlarge)
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 | | show all 14 | | Tallinn-Helsinki-St. Petes tour | | Tallinn view | | old town wall | | |
| Today was the official first day of the "Tallin-Helsinki-St. Petersburg" tour. I arrived yesterday and spent the day running around town taking pictures, as the weather can change fast here. We all met at 5:00 for the orientation talk and then had a fantastic dinner together in the old town square. Today we met a local guide for a walking tour of the town and then had the rest of the day free. It's a pretty small group, 18 people, and mostly older folks. So far it seems like a pretty good group.
It's been 11 years since I was last here and the town has changed for the better. Tallinn is one of the few remaining old Hanseatic towns with it's historic core almost completely intact. Most of the original town wall and watch towers still encircle the old town, and it's a great place to wander, filled with shops, restaurants and cafes. Many of the old buildings have been restored and the place seems to be thriving. The first time I was here, the area outside the old town was a wasteland of communist era block apartments and abandoned factories. Many of those have now been replaced by a new downtown, with shopping malls and office buildings. Ironic how fast a gleaming capitalist society has risen out of the ruins of it's communist past.
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