The Last instalment, bye for now Estonia!

 

Leah and Arvi somewhere in Lahemaa national park

Wow so much has happened since we first arrived in Estonia 3 months ago.  We have meet so many new friends, seen so many places, learnt about our family histories and Arvi has significantly improved his tolerance to alcohol! Spew boy only comes out on rare special occasions now, yay! Here a quick update on things you may have missed or we forgot to mention.

in front of a windmill in Rocca Al Mare

We both had some friends from back home visit us in Tallinn. First, my friend from uni Emily, who works in London, came to spend the weekend with me. It was so great to see her after over a year and we had a great time exploring the foggy beach at Pirita, showing her around Tallinn and dancing up a storm at Studio nightclub.

Leah and Emily on foggy Pirita beach

hugging near fat Margaret 

Arvi’s friend Steve from London also came to stay for about a week. While these two spent a lot of their time catching up and partying in the bar, we managed to fit in a couple of outings. One of these outings was a 4 hour bike ride out to Rocca Al Mare and around the open air museum. We spent hours exploring the old cottages with thatched roofs, old farms, windmills and learnt how Estonians lived hundreds of years ago.

Riding through the open air museum 

panoramic of the open air museum 

In the second week of May we thought it might be time to have some couple time again so we hired a car and set off to explore Lahemaa National park. We thought it would take some time for Arvi to get used to driving on the wrong side of the road and the opposite side of the car but it was easy enough and we were off. We drove to some little old fishing villages and walked the beautiful coastline, the beach starting right on the edge of forest. While walking through the tracks in Lahemaa, we were on the constant look out for the few bears, beavers and moose that are said to inhabit the forest. Unfortunately, we didn’t see any but there were lots of frogs near the river ahhhh!! It was so bad I ended up being led back to the car by Arvi, screaming with my eyes closed so I couldn’t see them.

Leah just saw some frogs

Rocks that floated on icebergs from sweden and finland 1000's of years ago

walking in the mets

In our last month we also got a chance to visit the university town of Tartu for one night. We were kindly put up by ‘Terviseks’, a small, chilled hostel right in the centre of old town. It was a hot day when we arrived, with temperatures in the high 20’s and the mossies were out in force! They were bigger than those in Australia and can bite through anything! We spent that evening catching up with our Estonian friend Heleri, who we met while she was living in Australia. She was like our tour guide showing us around and we had dinner at an old gunpowder storage place made into a beer hall. We also got a chance to catch up with Triinu from Parnu. We spent our second day exploring some castle ruins and the KGB museum. We both found it very interesting reading about the Soviet Occupation and the several deportations that took place. We ended our trip to Tartu with some beers with Triinu in the only park you’re allowed to drink in public. This place is often filled with university students but due to the recent rain, there weren’t many people around and we were getting eaten alive by mossies.

In Tartu botanical gardens

Maarius from Maxtractor live at Red Emperor (we work with him , youtube it)

Triinu sandwich 

To sum up, our time in Estonia has been amazing. We are so glad we decided to spend some time living and working there rather than simply passing through. We were sad to leave all our new friends, but excited to continue our travels. It was easier saying goodbye knowing we will be back in November before coming home.

Head agega Estonia!!! Stay tunned for our summer European adventures.