What to do in Tallinn - a winter wonderland

Hi, readers!

Long time no see, I know. Shame on me. Posting on the blog is of my 2022 goals, so fingers crossed I can stick to this one! But I’m back now and I'm very happy about it, especially with such an exciting post! Becauseee…. *insert fictional drum roll* I have finally visited a true winter Christmas market!

I have been waiting to visit one for ages. My first choices were to go to Rovaniemi, in Finland, but Scandinavian countries were way over my budget. Then, we looked into Hamburg in Germany, and although the flights were at a reasonable price, the accommodation was also more than we wanted to spend.

So, we settled for Tallinn - and I have to say, I’m so happy that this ended up to be our destination.

We arrived in the city center at around 6pm on a Wednesday and checked into a small Airbnb, right in the heart of the old town, walking distance from everything we wanted to see. The town is quite small, but there were so many things we wanted to do and see, so let’s start!

We booked our flights with Lufthansa. Mariana paid less than me since I chose to take a checked-in bag. I paid a total of 225.16 EUR for my flight, bag included, from Lisbon to Tallinn with a layover in Frankfurt.

We decided to book an Airbnb, which you can check out by clicking here. Accommodation was surprisingly more affordable than I was expecting, considering the prices in Estonia are comparable to Scandinavian countries’. We paid a total of 234.74 EUR, for 2 people, for 4 nights. The Airbnb was an entire apartment, extremely well located (in Pikk Street, which is in the old town right next to the town hall where the Christmas markets are hosted), it was super clean and the hosts were incredibly welcoming. We couldn’t have asked for a better place to stay. Even if you are booking accommodation through another platform, this is definitely the area you should be looking for.

Once we landed, we decided to ask for a Bolt ride to the apartment - it was snowing, we had a lot to take with us and we were tired so we didn’t even look into buses or any other transportation. Although the ride is supposed to be quite quick, we were caught in peak hours in the city, so we ended up taking about half an hour to get to the apartment and we paid a total of 14.50 EUR.

As soon as we arrived, we dropped off our stuff and headed out to explore the city!

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What to do in Tallinn

Christmas market

This was the main purpose of our trip, so we dropped off our bags and headed our way to the Town Hall to see the Christmas market. It had an absolutely magical vibe: the Christmas tree, the Christmas songs, the smells of warm food and the small gift shops… I can’t decide what I liked best.

One good thing about Tallinn’s Christmas markets is that it is one of the markets that runs the longest. It starts at the end of November, and finishes at the beginning of January.

From the photos we saw online, it looked like it would have many more small cabins, however there were not that many compared to previous editions, and I believe this was due to Covid restrictions.

Highly recommend it if you want to get into the Christmas spirit with some hot chocolate and freshly cooked sausages with potatoes!

Ice Skating

Ice skating was one of the things we were most excited about! The ice skating rink in right in the old town, on, Harju Street, a quick 5 minute walk from the town hall.

It is an outdoor rink with a privileged view to the St. Nicolas Church, that with the surrounding snow gave us the dreamiest Christmas vibes.

We paid 11 EUR for our entry, ice skates included. They also have lockers, which you need to pay 3 EUR for, but we didn’t use them as everybody seemed to be leaving their belongings on the benches right next to the rink.

When we went there, it had a few groups of people skating, but we had plenty of space to keep ourselves (and mostly others) from any potential falls - on our behalf, of course, since everybody there seemed to have been born with ice skates on their feet.

We had plenty of fun! I confess that, since I am not used to this, it can get tiring pretty quickly, but it was a great break on the routine since we don’t have anything like this in Lisbon.

The rink is opened since December until the end of spring, so it is an absolute must if you are visiting Tallinn during the winter or spring.

Patkuli viewpoint

This is such a simple thing to do, but I think it was one of the most precious highlights of this trip. In case you didn’t know, Tallinn is a medieval town, and from the Patkuli viewpoint you will have the most beautiful view of the city’s buildings, towers and walls. A view I will definitely never forget!

Kohtuotsa viewpoint

Right after the Patkuli viewpoint, you will be able to have a slightly different view of the city at the Kohtuotsa viewpoint. If you have ever searched for images in Tallinn, you might recognise this one as the ‘The Times We Had’ wall - spoiler alert, this wall was full of random graffiti when I visited it, so not exactly as I expected. But, the view is great as well, and it is just a couple of minutes walking from the previous one.

Alexander Nevsky Cathedral

This orthodox cathedral is a must-see in Tallinn! To match Estonia’s neighbour, Russia’s style. It definitely stands out in Tallinn, while at the same time not over-shining the medieval vibe of the city.

St. Catherine’s Passage

St. Catherine’s passage is considered one of the most picturesque places of the city of Tallinn! It’s a narrow passage that connects Vene street and Müürivahe street. What makes it special is that it is in this passage that Katariina Guild is located. Katariina Guild is a group of craftsmen workshops that you can visit for a true medieval experience. Too bad that I only found this out after I left Tallinn :’(

Tower of St. Mary’s Cathedral

I visited the tower of St. Mary’s Cathedral, as I've heard it had a beautiful view of the city. In fact, it has! There’s a privileged overlook over Alexander Nevsky Cathedral. The price to go up the tower is 5 euros. Now, is it worth the price and the hike through the narrowest stairs you’ll ever see in your life? I don’t regret going up, but I probably wouldn’t repeat it. You can get an equally beautiful view in any of the viewpoints I mentioned previously, free of charge and without getting scared to death that you will fall face down while going up and down the tower’s stairs.

Tallinn’s city walls platform

This was another attraction that, although interesting, disappointed me a bit. We paid 3 EUR to go up, and we had a small overlook over some buildings, which included a school. Basically this place is a medieval defence wall, with a balcony that you can walk over. We didn’t know exactly what to expected, but we visited, enjoyed as much as we could and went on with our day!

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Where to eat in Tallinn

We had all our meals out, and while some of them were not that remarkable, some of them really surprised me in a positive way! So those are the ones I’ll be talking about (click on the titles to be re-directed to their TripAdvisor pages).

Olde Hansa

This is not only a restaurant, it is a whole experience! Olde Hansa gives you the chance to live a true medieval meal - the entire restaurant is candle lit only, the waiters and head to toe dressed up, they act according to the medieval times and even the plates and cutlery are matching the entire vibe!

Mariana had the salad with two kinds of fish, and I had the salmon with forest mushrooms. For dessert, we had what they called ‘apple and honey under a crispy coat’ which I really enjoyed, and another dessert that they called the Christmas dessert. This last one, to be honest, didn’t impress me, mostly because it was mainly made of nuts, which I don’t appreciate that much. Besides this particular sweet, everything else was really good and the experience was one of a kind!

Rataskaevu 16

This was our last meal in Tallinn, and we hadn’t decided to go there until last minute, but I’m so happy we did because we got one of the best services in the entire trip.

Their staff was beyond welcoming, and the food was also amazing.

I was not that hungry, so I just had a duck starter, and Mariana had an oats risotto that she loved. For dessert, I asked for the warm chocolate cake - one of those that are melted inside, with vanilla ice cream, and it was heaven on Earth.

For this, and drinks (water and a beer), we paid a total of 31.70 EUR.

Sadly I didn’t take any pictures besides the dessert one, but Mariana took this one that she kindly lent me to post here:

Rost

Rost is known for their cinnamon buns. We included this on our itinerary because we heard that they were really amazing, and it did not disappoint. Right before you turn the street you already feel the cinnamon scent in the air. I confess that cinnamon stuff usually doesn’t excite me that much because its flavour is a bit too strong, but these buns were divine and so soft! We loved it so much that we came back the next day!

ÜLO

Ulo is a modern kind of hipster restaurant near the Tallinn market. The concept is quite fun: the average estonian male citizen named Ulo is 66 years old, and what the restaurant considers ‘behind in time’, so they decided to give a young and modern look to Ulo the restaurant. It is a great place for vegetarians, although they also serve some meat and fish dishes. For starters, we had the sweet potato with kimchi, and then we had the baked chicken breast and a noodle dish. The staff was one of the nicest in town. The only downside is that I asked for a lemonade, unaware that they are usually sparkly in Estonia :( but even so, it was a great place to go during our trip!

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These were the main things that we did! Although I loved all of these things, there are some others that unfortunately we didn’t have time to do, so here’s a list in case you can include them in your trip:

• As I mentioned, I would love to have visited the Katariina Guild

• Visit the Kardriorg Palace and its gardens

• Go to Telliskivi Loomelinnak, which is a complex that houses galleries, nice restaurants, shops and so on

• Although I haven’t been up to museums lately, I would have loved to visit the Estonian Open Air museum

Also, since we’re in the middle of a pandemic, I would also like to mention that we had to take an antigen covid test to come back to Portugal. We booked ours through a company named Eldred and paid 39 EUR. We booked the closest location to the city center, and when we got there we realised that the testing location was the sketchiest van parked in a public parking lot. I admit, I was a bit tempted to turn around and find another place, but we ended up doing our test there and everything was fine. We got our results about 2 hours later, with all the information we needed to go back home.

And this is basically it! I hope this post inspires you to visit this wonderful city that surprised me a LOT, and that you find it as charming as I did.

Thank you for reading!