Tallinn

July 2nd
Tallinn Estonia

Today was my second time in Estonia, and today I had one objective - find vodka. Last time I was here with the Navigator, my old roommate Pieter found some Estonian Vodka that was the best vodka he’d ever had, and after trying it myself way back when I remembered thinking the same thing. Ever since I’ve been trying to find Estonian Vodka anytime I’ve walked by a vodka display (mind you, not that often an occurrence), so I was determined to find that same bottle I remember from almost a year ago.
I got off the ship with about 90 minutes left of port time (early sail away) in search of my goal, and after asking a couple girls on the street who were giving out free samples of almonds, I quickly located an alcohol shop. It didn’t take long for me to find the bottle I remembered seeing Pieter with, and with excitement purchased it. Mission Complete. But I still had 50 minutes left to walk around, so I went exploring with my new purchase swinging from my hand in a plastic bag.
I forgot how beautiful Estonia was and had a very pleasant walk through the city. It was extremely busy due to the 5 cruise ships in port, but still gorgeous. I didn’t do much more than walk around just because of my time constraints. I did however almost manage to get hit by a tram (yeah, I bet that makes Mom and Dad feel good, and no, I wasn’t drinking the vodka). Tallinn has these trams running through the city for public transportation, and I’m sure it’s a really good system, but the safety is not. This track was set on a grassy area between two roads just coming out of a turn. I had crossed the first road, and upon stepping onto the grassy area with my sights set on crossing the second road, heard a strange metallic sound that I couldn’t recognize. I kept walking trying to figure out what it was by listening really attentively, and it wasn’t till I crossed the first set of tram tracks that I looked to my right and saw the thing coming right at me. I had realized just soon enough to not have to jump out of the way or anything dramatic like that, but I was about 3 steps away from breaking my bottle of vodka…and a couple other things. Anyways, after yelling at myself about not looking around, I continued walking and contemplating how I’ve probably never been closer to serious injury since joining cruise ships. Let’s just hope that doesn’t happen again.
Well, now that I have you all worried about my well being in recently communist satellites, I guess I’ll wrap up the post. We had a usual guest artist show that night and I shared my vodka with a lot of people, drinking very little of it myself. I don’t know that it’s quite as good as I remembered, but my friends all seemed to appreciate its quality. Anyways, that’s about it for my most recent near death experience. Thanks for reading and let’s hope for many more posts to come!

Oh yeah, and I also got attacked by a seagull walking back to the ship. It appears that I walked too close to it’s nest which it had strategically built in the rocks directly next to the road. Before I knew it I was literally getting dive-bombed by this black-headed seagull with the most hideous screech I’ve ever heard. After a couple passes within inches of my skull, some guy informed me of my mistake and I took off running, once again afraid for my life, but this time with a slight smile. I’m just glad he didn’t release any projectiles in his raid. After escaping dockside no-man’s land, I walked away peacefully to the sounds of the seagull attacking the next naïve victim of avian trespassing.