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| No Horizon line on Lake Peipsi - Marina looks suspended in space. |
Day 42 - July 23, From Tallin to Tartu
For Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania Photo Ablum, Click HERE
We spend most of the day traveling through gently undulating farm lands of greens and gold, oats and wheat, and deep green forests along the fringes. Estonia is quite flat with beautiful fields but a fairly short growing season. One of our along-the-way leg stretches is a short walk to Jargala water falls. It is Estonia's biggest and best in the winter when frozen. Today it it's width is greatly reduced with the summer water flow, and it's height is about 2 stories high, very little drop in elevation as it lazily meanders to the sea.
About 3:30 we arrive in Tartu and make our way to our AirBNB which is in tattered 1930's era building that belies the inside loveliness of a spacious apartment with beautiful pine wood flooring. Our host is Signe who is home while her husband and 4 daughters are off camping at their rustic summer cottage.
Signe takes us for a walk to old town Tartu, only five minutes away, and orients us in the city and helps us to pick out a cafe for dinner. We settle in an outdoor. eating area in the plaza in front of town hall at Pierres and order a salad and main dish. We are ovrewhelmed with huge portions. We could have shared and still had plenty. The food was excellent. We both ordered pasta bakes. Russ had smoked chicken and broccoli. I had shrimp, salmon, and spinach. Both were in a creamy white sauce-penne pasta base with broiler browned melted cheddar. Yumyum. Good thing we are doing a lot of walking.
Day 43 - July 24 Tartu, KGB Museum, Lake Peipsi, and Historic barge sail.
Signe prepared a wonderful breakfast for us of , rich brown breads with buter and cream cheese, water melon, scrambled eggs, fruit smoothies and coffee. After our hardy breakfast we went for a long walk in and around Tartu which is home of a large and prestigious University. The school is quiet during the summer and we are delighted with the wide open, lightly used parks, streets, and walkways....definitely not touristy like Tallin. Love it.
Our first stop is the KGB Cells, dungeon. The dark grey building we walk to used to be the home of KGB in Estonia. The museum is downstairs in the dungeon where anti-soviet thinkers were tortured and sent to Siberia. Estonia, under threat of war and hostile invasion by Russia, naively signed an agreement of non-aggression with the Russians in 1938, that presumably gave Russia permission to build military basis in Estonia in exchange for not being invaded by the Russians. Well, once the bases were being built, the Russians rolled in and took over anyway. Estonia, thought their best alternative to expel the Russians was to align with Germany during WWII. Much of Estonia suffered severe damage during the war, and afterwards, was given back to Russia in 1944, to suffer even more.
LEST WE FORGET
Of course, the country was reeling from the war and devastating loss of independence. Anti-soviet dissent was on the rise and the dissenters were interrogated, tortured, and sent to gulags in Siberia. The museum is a grim but necessary reminder of Soviet oppression and KGB ruthless assault on humanity. Keep in mind that Vladimir Putin was a KGB Lieutenant Colonel for 16 years before going into politics 1991 when the USSR collapsed. Are we seeing history repeat itself as Putin longs for the "good old days" ? The people of Estonia go about their daily business, but there is concern and tension. Signe reported one sighting of Russian fighter plans over Tartu a while back.We spent the remainder of the early afternoon wandering old town Tartu. One of the old buildings leans more than the tower of Pisa and is supported by a neighboring building with 2 iron cross beams. There are beautiful green parkways along the river where pre-WWI buildings stood before being bombed.
In the late afternoon we drive forty minutes out of town to visit Lake Peipsi. Similar to Lake Tahoe, there is a border running somewhere through the Lake separating Estonia from Russia. Russian patrol boats chase out those who stray in to perceived Russian territory. Getting a view of the lake by driving along the frontage road is difficult as there are tall marsh reeds growing around the perimeter. We drive through a winding string of homes for mikes until we reach a marina where we finally get a view of the lake. There is a haze that obliterates the horizon and the sky. The marina looks as if it were floating in mid air. We wade in to the warm shallow water before returning to Tartu.
Once we return and eat dinner at MacDonalds, our hamburger fix, we board the Peipsi Historic Barge at 8:00 pm for a sunset cruise.. It's been another lovely day.
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