We woke up before the alarm. All of our washing was dry so we finished packing our bags and tidied up the apartment. We left our suitcases behind (and my laptop) and left with just a backpack and bag to cover a few days of clothes. We then went to Pipsas flat to return the keys, and were on our way. Our original plan was to have breakfast locally and return the keys but we changed our mind and did the keys first to get breakfast intown.

We caught the train and tram to get to the ferry terminal – very easy especially as Pipsahad installed the local transport app for me. Checkin hadn’t opened as we were more than 2 hours early. We wandered around for a bit and then used the self Checkin kiosk.

We went upstairs to the restaurant to grab some food and then just passed the time until boarding. It was quite smooth and took less than 20 minutes to get us all on – we actually departed a little early! We put our bag in the lock room so we didn’t have to carry it and had some food. We were feeling a bit sleepy so went for a walk around the ship.

Outside was quite breezy and cool, as well as smokey, so we went back indoors. There were several bars and entertainment areas around the ship.

We found some brochures for Tallinn, got a chai latte and planned how we would spend our time once we arrived. We pulled in to port at 2.00, right on time. We got off the ferry and made our way by foot to the old town where we were staying. There was no immigration which made the whole process much quicker than last time i did this trip in 2001.

With the help of Google maps we easily found Tallinn city apartments and luckily Kaoru remembered i had received an email with the access code – one for the front door and one for the key box. We took our bags up to the room and then left to make the most of the day.

We went across the road to the tourist information centre and worked out how to catch the bus to the Open Air Museum. We had to go to a kiosk to buy the bus ticket. Rather than paying €2 each way (the easy way) we decided to try the more challenging way of using the pass which is €1.10/hour or€3/day. And we were off.

We got off the bus one stop early. ..The name was the same but this stop had a suffix on it. So it took us a little longer to get there but the exercise was good. We payed to get in to the grounds and could then freelywalk around. Kaoru found a map (50c) whichhad a suggested route so we followed that. We got to look at old shacks and see a bit of farm life. The houses had people sitting out the front with varying levels of interaction with us. At one place the lady had some notes in japanese so she explained it to Kaoru and she had to explain to me! (What i hadn’t understood already).

We had some food and drink at a cafe to recharge us and continued our exploring. Wehad finished around 7 and caught the next bus back to the city.

We walked around the city to a couple of the sightseeing spots. Up high on the city wall we had magnificent views! For dinner we went to a themed restaurant from an old time tavern. I had a sausage and an ox rib, and a beer to wash it down.

After some more exploring Kaoru was hungry, so we went to a supermarket to get some food and some water for tomorrow. We got a rice meal which Kaoru fried up as we didn’t have a microwave in the room. It was delicious, for a cheap, easy meal.

We took our maps and went to find a bar to plan our tomorrow over a drink. We had planned to have an early night but by the time this was all done it was about midnight, so we went to bed and feel asleep pretty quickly. It was the darkest night we had experienced for some time now. Outside wasstill very lively with music from the restaurant across the road.