Arriving in Tallinn, I almost immediately decide it’s a lovely city. I’m not sure how much of this is because it’s not raining. We cycle along the foreshore to the Piriti Caravan Camping – a small patch of land surrounded by boats and harbour. It has grass, power, and picnic tables, and is wonderfully cheap. It even comes with a free bonus sunset over the ocean.
My affection for Tallinn only grows as we get up to clear sunny skies the following morning. We try to get away early, and wander gradually into town, looking at sculptures and sights along the way, and then slowly meandering around the city, though the statues and plaques and old buildings and cobbled streets. Spending all this time in Europe has led me to realise that although cobbled streets are quaint, they are not the most fantastic riding surface for a fully loaded touring bike.
We head out west from Tallinn, sticking close to the coast, on what is Estonia’s Cycle Route 1. There are bike lanes, wide shoulders, and the roads are in good condition. The day is sunny and there’s not much traffic, and when we get near the sea it sparkles and looks blue and tempting. Gradually the roads deteriorate in quality – there are obviously lots of new roads being laid though (lots of EU funds at work). There are occasional patches of headwind, but on the whole the traffic is light and roads are fine.
The first night we camp wild, in the midst of some sort of insect infestation; for the second I put up the tent it gets covered in: ants, ticks, spiders, lady bugs, stink bugs, grasshoppers, flies, mosquitos and midges. Gah!
The following day the roads are a little worse, the terrain is flat, and there’s an irritating head-breeze. The population of Estonia is only 1.3 million, and it’s apparent that not many of those people are living out where we’re riding. There are lots of abandoned looking buildings, with cement peeling off bricks, stones patching holes in brickwork, weathered and rotting wood and obvious ex-Soviet structures. Some of the old decrepit looking buildings are obviously still being used though.
After wasting some time researching transport options between Riga and Vilnius (there’s no train, only buses), we head on to the coast, and find a campground by the sea.
Another front flat for Alex the next morning is leading to contemplation of the next round of tyre purchasing when we hit Schwalbe country again. After lunch at Lindi Bog (which is not being cut up and burnt, unlike the Irish bogs) we cycle on to Pärnu. Heading onwards we end up stuck on the main Tallinn-Riga road – yes, this is where the Route 1 has taken us. Whoosh whoosh! We concentrate on balancing on our small strip of shoulder, and thankfully relax when we finally find a spot to camp for the night. We’re just near the coast, but the beach here looks more like a swamp.
Thanks to a temporary parallel road, we have a quiet morning cycle, before crossing the border into Latvia at Ainaži. Some grocery shopping and admiring the old border control paraphernalia, then we continue, and the boredom kicks in again. We’re back on the main Tallinn-Riga road, and sit balanced on a generally small shoulder, with a slight headwind and constant traffic whooshing past at almighty speeds. Occasionally we get a break, on an old bit of road or bike path. But most of the day is tedious and noisy, and we stop fairly often to avoid descending into madness.
It’s on one of these forest stops that we find some chanterelle mushrooms in the forest and collect them for dinner (cooked not long afterwards in a pleasantly located campground by a lake outside of Carnikava, just north of Riga – we pay for the location, and not the facilities, which are a bit on the primitive side. The mushrooms are tasty though).
The terrible alarm clock wakes us at 6am, and after a quick wash in the lake we pack and leave. Cycling along the highway WHOOSH WHOOSH, then into Riga we hit bike paths which inexplicably disappear, then onto the patched pavements and streets of Riga. Beat-up old electric buses shuffle around, and we bump bump gradually to the bus station, admiring the sights as we go (including hoards of kids in their best clothes carrying armfuls of flowers – it’s International Students Day).
Arriving at the bus station we plan to inquire about buses to Vilnius. There’s one in 15 minutes, and we should ask the driver what he wants done with the bikes. We race over, and he tells us to just put them underneath. We realise there are only going to be five of us on the bus, so we basically have the luggage compartment to ourselves. On the downside, our lunch is going to be whatever we can scavenge from the bus station in the next 5 minutes. But we’re on the bus! And looking at the scenery as we drive through it, we’re not terribly depressed about missing the cycle to Vilnius.
Distance: 581km
Flaginess levels: Moderate
Wifi availability: Good
Days of rain: 3/6
Mooses: Our time in Estonia and Latvia was entirely moose-free, despite the signs advising of their presence.
Random fact: The Baltic Way (a.k.a. Baltic Chain or Chain of Freedom) was a peaceful political demonstration that occurred on August 23, 1989. Approximately two million people joined their hands to form a human chain spanning over 600 kilometres across the three Baltic states, then republics of the Soviet Union. It marked the 50th anniversary of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. The pact and its secret protocols divided Eastern Europe into spheres of influence and led to the occupation of the Baltic states in 1940.
One reply on “Cycling: Estonia, Latvia, and into Lithuania (27 August – 1 September 2009)”
Hehehe, non-rainy weather certainly helps to improve favourability, although ouch to the crazy insect attack – I’d run straight into a hostel :p