Estonia and Latvia

This past weekend I was able to travel to Tallinn, Estonia and Riga, Lativa as a part of my study abroad experience. We left Thursday night at around 10:30 pm and departed on our 9 hour, overnight bus ride for Tallinn Estonia. After a check of our passports at the Estonian boarder....at 4 am..... we continued to the Medieval city of Tallinn. Before our arrival we were greeted to Estonia by a wonderful sunrise penetrating the fog that covered the cold Birch tree forests.

Upon our arrival to Tallinn we ate a wonderful breakfast and got on the bus to meet our tour guide. As we drove and walked though the city we noticed multiple small police escorted motorcades with black government cars. We also noticed a much higher presence of police officers on the streets and street corners. We were then informed that there was an EU Digital Summit being held in Tallinn that same day. We actually saw the French motorcade carrying the French President Emmanuel Macron. The people in the back of our walking tour actually even saw him! I unfortunately was in the front and did not see him. Later in the day there were a few other group members who saw British Prime Minister Teresa May as well. I wish I would have!

This is the french motorcade...

On our tour we learned a little more about Tallinn. It was founded in 1201 and has two thirds of its medieval wall still standing. This is about 1.8 km or slightly less than one mile long. In some parts this wall is 12 feet thick!

We also learned that the Orthodox Church in the picture below was built in 1900 as part of the Czarist times when Estonia was part of the Russian Empire. This church was built along with others in now Eastern Europe as part of an attempt of Russification during that time. The inside was beautiful. Is was the first time I have ever been inside an Orthodox Church. As I ascended the stairs I grew in anticipation, knowing that Orthodox Churches are very ornate. As I walked in, a certain sensory overload occurred. There was so much to look at. Every inch of the walls were painted with murals of historic figures of Christianity and golden paint. The smell of incense increased the other worldly feeling that I experienced in this church. The paintings of the apostles and other Christian figures made me feel like I was actually among them; this is of course why Orthodox churches do this, they want you to feel a certain connection with the historic figures of the church.

After the tour we ascended the steeple of St. Olav's Church. This is the most prominent and tall building in the skyline of old town Tallinn. In its roughly 700 or 800 year existence it has been struck by lightning at least 10 times and three of those lightning strikes caused extensive fires. Upon paying the three euro fee, we ascended the rather small spiral staircase, made completely of stone, that lead to the top. Thinking about how old this stone staircase was, and how high we were going, made me slightly nervous at times. However, when we made it to the top, I knew the somewhat questionable journey up was well worth it. The views were great! It was odd though because we were on a scaffolding like structure outside the roof of the church. I felt like the tower was swaying ever so slightly but considering it was stone, I knew it was just me.

St. Olav's is the big tall white church

us at the top

The next day we were allowed to explore Tallinn some more and then we headed to the bus to take the 5 hour drive back down to Riga. Once we arrived in Riga we did another walking tour where we saw a lot of the city. The sky was beautiful because during the tour the sun was setting painting a beautifully colored orange/red sky. The next day we went to an Anglican church service. The congregation was only 26 people strong so the presence of our group of 28 more than doubled the population.

inside the Anglican Church

With our time left in Riga we decided to go up to the top of the 26 floor Radisson hotel. There was a restaurant on top of this tower with pretty views of Riga. To be honest, the bathroom had the best view. Right beside the urinal was a huge window in which you could look down upon Riga like it was your kingdom. It was really cool. We then went down and went into another, even more beautiful Orthodox Church. This church gave me the same feeling as the other one but it was just larger. At the top of the church in the dome was a massive painting of Jesus looking down upon me. It was very cool. Orthodox churches are officially my favorite churches in terms of their architecture and beauty.

We then bused to a really good lunch buffet at a place called Lido. It was really good! We were all quite full by the end. We then headed to the bus for the last time to finish the 4 hour drive back to LCC.

This trip was very fun. Tallinn was my favorite city out of the two. The weather was well behaved and the temperatures topped out in the mid 50's. Here are some more miscellaneous pictures from the trip!

the city square in Tallinn