Tag: Tallinn

The first visit I had here was a little sub-optimal as it was cloudy and that does impact a view somewhat when you’re in the middle of the bloody cloud.

I was nearby so I decided to have another go at getting photos and here they are. I had purchased the Tallinn Card again, so there was no additional charge for popping back.

The botanical gardens that we visited last time. That was really for Susanna, I didn’t go back this time.

This photo had some snow in it for extra excitement.

Yes, it was quite windy up there. It’s rather warmer when standing inside looking out, but I didn’t really want photos with reflection all over them so I went outside. It’s not visible from the photos but there is a gate there to stop people falling off the side.

One of the holes in the floor.

It was nice to visit again, although I only stayed for around twenty minutes as there’s a limit to how much excitement can be dragged out of a visit like this.

After Polarbeargate, I was ready to explore the rest of Tallinn Zoo which is the only zoo in Estonia.

The zoo map which has been in operation since the 1930s (the zoo, not the map). Although for anyone interested in old maps of the zoo, here’s one from fifteen years ago.

First of all, I was not impressed to see this. I don’t get my glasses until later this week and I had just been reading about a tiger which had escaped from San Francisco Zoo so I planned how to attack what I thought was an escaped tiger at Tallinn Zoo. I thought I’d hit it with my battery pack, but I wasn’t entirely sure that this was a viable strategy. It turned out that it wasn’t a real tiger, so I’m left wondering whether a tiger would run off after being hit by a battery pack or just be even more annoyed. I rather suspect the latter.

The zoo’s leopard was just pacing up and down, which I’m really not sure is a healthy situation for a big cat.

An emerald tree skink.

I thought that this looked very realistic. I then realised it looked realistic as it was real. I’m looking forward to my glasses.

A reticulated python eyeing me up for lunch.

It didn’t take its eyes off me.

The camouflage really is impressive.

This is a pitcher plant which is a carnivorous plant which traps insects.

Cute, this is a dhole.

My new favourite animal since I’ve gone off polar bears, the meerkat.

Sleepy.

Tortoises.

All was well and I didn’t need to alert the zookeepers.

A rhino.

A cuddly seal! I’d add, it’s recommended not to cuddle them as otherwise they’ll want to be domesticated and taken on trips to the shopping centre.

Two yellow tree monitors.

A green tree python.

I don’t want one as a pet, although apparently people do keep these to love and hold them.

A white faced muskox. If I had to choose between a green tree python and this as a pet, I’d have this. I suspect that this would cause issues on Wizz Air flights as I’d struggle to call this a support animal and I’d have to pay for a separate seat. I never pay to select my seat, so the same would happen here and my pet muskox would be someone else’s problem to sit next to for the flight.

It’s a generally decent zoo, although there are signs where there are some outdated enclosures and there’s obviously work to do. I know some people would like zoos to close, but I still think that they have a valuable educational, breeding, conservation and protection role to play. There were nearly no other visitors when I was there, other than hoards of kids on school trips although they were young and easy to avoid as they were quite noisy which meant I could bypass them without any issues.

Incidentally, I can’t get very good photos with my phone at the moment of any animal that’s actually moving. It takes around five seconds to get the camera on now and another extra second to take a photo. This is fine for snakes and lazy animals that don’t much move about, but it makes taking photographs of cats much harder.

With my Tallinn Card, I took the bus to have a little look at the city’s zoo. One of the new parts of the zoo is the polar bear enclosure, or the Polarium as they call it.

The cuddly polar bear playing.

How cute.

She seemed to be enjoying herself. I’m not a polar bear expert, but the zoo has two of them and I’m going to gamble that this was the female one.

I can’t remember which one this was.

I think I was just about the only visitor at the zoo and the polar bear came over to have a look at what was happening. Actually, I’m not really sure which was which as they do both look like polar bears.

He had an appearance of not being entirely happy.

And then the bloody thing started running and jumped up to the glass in an attempt to hug me. I was bloody delighted at just how tough the glass was as the polar bear was determined to pounce and he came towards me at one hell of a rate. This was not a happy polar bear.

He seemed annoyed to have been foiled by what he must have thought was a force field. I’ve gone off polar bears now, I’ve decided that I wouldn’t have lasted long if that glass would have caved in. You know where you are with meerkats, so I’ve decided that I prefer them now.

Whilst I was at the zoo busy on Google finding out whether a polar bear could break glass, I read about the story of three idiots who annoyed a tiger at San Francisco zoo and the big cat managed to kill one of them.

I can confirm that this is accurate as a polar bear helpfully stood one side of the glass whilst I was on the other. They’re quite big when you get close up.

This painting, at the House of Peter the Great, of Mikhail I of Russia (the Russian Tsar between 1613 and 1645) is original, although it’s not known who painted it. It was donated to Tallinn’s Brotherhood of the Blackheads in 1639 and there was a copy made in 1728 by Johann Heinrich Wedekind and this is in a Moscow art gallery. It’s that copy which is used on sites such as Wikipedia to illustrate articles about the former Tsar, meaning that this painting tucked away in Estonia is one of the best representations that there is of the Russian leader Mikhail I.

He’s wearing the royal dress of the early seventeenth century and he had some reason to feel regal and proud as he brought a stability to Russia after the Time of Troubles which lasted between 1598 and 1613. This was a sub-optimal period for Russia, as there was a famine that killed a third of the country’s population and lawlessness was seemingly everywhere. Peter the Great lived between 1672 and 1725 and so I rather like to think that this painting was here during his time as Tsar, I can almost imagine him wandering by it giving a little nod to mark his seal of approval.

What else could I do in a relatively cold Tallinn on a Sunday evening in early February? After much thought, an Asian meal of some description seemed to be the most tempting and the reviews of Asian Wok were positive. They seem to cut across quite a chunk of southern Asian food, including plenty of Chinese and Indian dishes. I checked the menu on-line around fifteen seconds before going in, an advisable thing to do as the menu outside the front door has one of the smallest font sizes that I’ve ever seen. I’ve just had my eyes tested and told that I can see things up close perfectly, but my elderly friends (they know who they are) would have had one hell of a job.

I was the only customer in the restaurant when I entered, although a couple came in a little later on, but there were plenty of delivery orders going on. The service was friendly and personable, with the beer being served promptly, although the food took nearly forty minutes which seemed a little longer than I had expected. But, I was hardly in a rush.

They usually have Asian beers, but they’d run out tonight and so there was the lager from A. Le Coq, the oldest brewery in Estonia. As lagers go, it was fine, crisp and clean.

I went for the chicken madras and the curry really wasn’t particularly madras like and there was no evidence of chillies or anything with spice. I know that many Indian restaurants across mainland Europe tend to change their spice levels for the local market, but I was struggling to get any heat out of this. The restaurant uses chicken thigh meat which I accept can give more flavour and is likely more authentic, although personally I do prefer chicken breast for the texture. The menu made reference to this being at their highest spice level and mentioned that the madras came with coconut in the sauce. I’m not sure that’s always the case, but I think it would help balance the spice levels out somewhat, but it just made it even more creamy here. Having noted that, the taste wasn’t unpleasant, the rice was well cooked and the naan bread had a depth of flavour. I asked for plain naan, although I noted that half of the naan were garlic.

I did enjoy the meal, the entire bill for the curry, rice, naan and half a litre of beer came to around £15, so it was all reasonably priced and the portion sizes were generous. It’s the first time incidentally that I’ve been given a curry in a bucket like that, although it helped keep it warm given that the plate itself was cold. I think if I came again I might request that the curry be made with more spice, although it feels quite British to do that in some macho way. I think I stayed here for around two hours as I rather got distracted with my book (well, book on a phone) and the service was always personable and helpful, so I’d recommend it if asked (the restaurant, not my phone which to be honest is on its last legs).

This painting is located at the House of Peter the Great and it was painted by Karl Burman (1882-1965) in June 1945. It makes him look like a hands-on ruler with his aides ready to offer help.

This is the location in the room where the artist thought that Peter the Great might have been sitting. It would have been an interesting time for Burman to paint something like this, Estonia was under effective Soviet control with the puppet leadership of Johannes Vares and they would have liked the thought of Peter the Great having a relevance here.

Incidentally, Vares killed himself at the Residence of the President of Estonia, located opposite from the museum.

This was an exciting little treat. OK, it might look like a bungalow in a park, but this is one of the oldest surviving properties in Tallinn and it’s also the former residential property of Peter the Great. There’s something quite decadent about spending an hour in a property where one of the most important figures in history once lived.

The staff here were friendly, engaging and helpful, so there was a welcoming feel to what is a relatively small museum. I was taken downstairs, and I wasn’t given much choice in the matter, to watch a video about the history of the building. However, I was pleased to see this as it was a useful introduction to the site and there are some information boards in the cellar as well.

The property was originally owned by the local merchant Hermann von Drenteln in the late seventeenth century and in 1714 it was sold to Peter the Great by his widow. She did well out of the arrangement, getting 1,400 roubles which apparently was a generous payment for the property. Peter the Great and his wife Catherine (later Catherine I) used the property when they stayed in Tallinn whilst the Kadroig Palace was being constructed. One of the reasons that the Tsar liked it was because it had views over the city and the Gulf of Tallinn (probably soon known in the US as the Gulf of America) which was handy as there were some battles going on in that area. The rooms H and I were wooden additions by Peter and they were later taken down, with A being the entrance hall, F the kitchen, C the living room and D the bedroom.

The living room with its large oval table.

The bedroom is located at the end of the building and it’s necessary to go through the living room to get there.

I understand that the bed is original, but the original silk canopy and bed cover fell apart during the eighteenth century and so these are more modern replacements. The video I watched at the beginning of the visit mentioned that visitors kept taking souvenirs such as feathers from the pillow and fabric from the coverings, so it’s not entirely that much of those remained. Bloody tourists.

The information about this room states that the armchair was owned by Peter the Great and was built by a local craftsman, although it looks in rather good condition to me for its age.

The dining room. In Peter the Great’s time, the dining room was located in the now demolished extension and a small mezzanine level was added in the 1804 to 1806 reconstruction and that’s when this room was added. That means that Peter and Catherine never visited the room in this state, but the table and chairs are original to the property and were used by the couple. I assume that quite a lot of repair and restoration has taken place here, particularly on the chairs, as they all look relatively new to me.

The kitchen which was basic, but functional.

The chimney type arrangement that’s above where the fire pit was located.

Peter the Great died in 1725 and the house began to fall into disrepair, although the interiors were mostly kept in place. Tsar Alexander I visited Tallinn in the early nineteenth century and was told about the property, which he went to visit. He ordered it to be restored and it was, opening as a museum in 1806, the oldest in Tallinn (or Reval as it was then). The rooms that had been located at the end of the property were demolished, but they were located in the foreground of the above photo. Catherine built herself quite a decent garden, but I think it’s fair to say (and I’m not a gardening expert) has been lost.

There’s normally an admission charge of €5 to visit, but I got in free with the Tallinn Card. The reviews are nearly all very positive about this museum and it’s surprised me with just how much has survived here from the eighteenth century. All really rather lovely.

This is a birch bark notebook which “Viktor” crossed out days whilst in exile. The 20 September 1942 was the last time that he crossed a day out, as he sadly died of TB three days later. That’s all the museum says, a hopeless lack of information and half a story.

However, a bit of research shows that there’s far more information known that the museum tells visitors. This belonged to Viktor Köster, born on 13 April 1921, who was deported in June 1941 with his mother Hildegard Köster to Ust-Churulka, Novosibirsk Oblast. This is located around half-way between Tallinn and St. Petersburg, relatively near to the Estonian border with Russia. Viktor died of tuberculosis on 23 September 1942 and his mother died of the same disease one year later, on 26 September 1943. Viktor’s father was arrested in 1941 and sentenced to death on 28 February 1942, with the killing taking place on 1 April 1942.

I did wonder for a while about the purpose of putting a stamp album on display, but this one is really rather cunning, indeed “a plan so cunning, you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel.”

Unfortunately, due to the clumsy way that this museum seems to tell its stories, it just refers to the owner being “Karl” even though I think the museum knows the surname. Anyway, the text of the exhibit notes that he was arrested in the summer of 1950 as he wanted to flee to Finland, so he was sentenced to 30 years of hard labour. He then promptly attempted to escape on three occasions, he certainly sounds like a strong and courageous individual. The museum then states that this was a way to get information and documents back from Siberia, but I don’t know if this was the case with Karl and without a surname, I can’t find out anything more about him. But, I still like the stamp album as a way to transport hidden documents and I think it’s original.