Estonian Sweaters and Soggy Sweeden

Dear Friends and Admirers,

Here is the story, mostly in pictures, of my long study tour to Tallinn, Estonia, and Stockholm, Sweden. This is the longest blog I have ever written and I hope I never have to write one this long again... although perhaps it would help if I did them more frequently and didn't bunch everything together at once... but that is the life of a professional procrastinator. SO - all aboard and enjoy the journey!!! 

Fat Margaret (The building) and Haley Mae (the person) welcome us into the old city of Tallinn, Estonia!

Me, Carissa, and Elise before entering the Old City!

The first thing we see in Tallinn is... Texas?

In Estonia, even bikes can have sweaters!

I thought this was so clever... a desk made of suitcases!

The church in the city center

Carissa, Haley Mae, and I posing with the door of the church that we didn't go in because it cost  money...

We found a very hygglelig cafe in Tallinn with the best hot chocolate around!

The cafe also had an assortment of chocolates... some of them were rather naughty. If you are sensitive  to naughtiness don't look too closely.

Even the bathroom of the cafe was cozy and aesthetically pleasing!

Even chairs outside have to be covered in sheepskin, apparently, to keep everyone warm and cozy. 

Another cute cafe with two stuffed bears enjoying a cuppa.

The bears looked friendly enough so I decided to join their tea party. 

This was my favorite church... It was commissioned by a mean Russian Czar or something like that and the specific religion that is supposed to be practiced in it has changed a few times and now Estonia isn't a part of Russia anymore (it gained it's independence in 1991) but it's still pretty awesome!

Me and Hay Hay in front of the churchy.

We also got to see the inside! It's mighty fancy in there. Lots of detailed decorations and golden things.

An old fashioned angel trumpet player!

Man riding a horse wrestling a sea monster or something like that

I always like to take pictures of the organs, because they are so big and pretty. 

It must be said... our bus had GIRAFFES on it!

Nesting dolls!!!

Me gracefully walking through the streets of Estonia. Oh, Estonia, you will be missed!

We took an overnight ferry from Tallinn to Estonia. It was more like a small cruise for one night. The ferry itself was awesome, but the room was a little tiny... This "room" was for four people and the beds are on the walls in this picture but they come down and then there is barely enough room to walk in between them. On the boat there were many activities - we went to a cool show with singing and dancing and sparkles and I also ended up singing "I'm a Believer" with two of my friends at the Karaoke Bar. There was also a "Disco" which was really fun and all the girls from my class conquered the dance floor together ;)

I'M ON A BOAT

All the girls in my class also got free caricatures... I don't know if you can tell from this picture but  the drawing is completely ridiculous and looks nothing like me. I think "Boris" (the artist) may have been a little annoyed with me for being the ten-thousandth non-paying customer and took it out on me in his drawing...

And then... we arrived in SWEDEN!

A serious Swedish Royal Guard member

He was guarding THIS, the castle.

Cheeky cherubs.

Lions also guard important buildings.

Because the city is so old, the buildings aren't neatly planned out. I like that better because then you end up with buildings that are cool shapes like this!

The streets of Stockholm.

During our scavenger hunt through the city, we decided to take a break and go into a cozy looking cafe. The lady in this shop, however, was a little strange and wouldn't let anyone sit in the cafe unless they bought a drink, even though we were the only people in there. She was nice enough to take a picture of our group though, but when she did she said "Welcome to Prison!" which we could never quite figure out what that meant... I must admit though I was pretty relieved when we were able to get out of there...

In Sweden we had the privilege of going to the VASA museum, where the OLDEST SHIP IN THE WORLD, called the Vasa, is preserved. It was Commissioned by the King of Sweden hundreds of years ago, and he wanted it to be the biggest and the best ship in all the land. However, he kept hearing about other countries who had made even bigger ships with better improvements, and so he kept giving new instructions to the ship builder even after it had started being built. Unfortunately, this made it so that the bottom of the ship was not wide or heavy enough to support the rest of the ship, but they couldn't make it heavier or it would sit in the water past the cannons, and water would seep in through the portholes. So basically when the ship was finally done being built it was really unstable. But it looked great! Anyway, the new fabulous ship that the king had commissioned went out to sea on the first day... and completely sank after 10 minutes, and an estimated 50 people died. The museum showcases all the artifacts that were scavenged from the bottom of the ocean when the ship was brought back to the surface hundreds of years later. It also showcases the skeletons of the people found at the the bottom with the shippy. They can tell lots of things about the people from their bones and the items they had with them at the time of death, which was really interesting to read about. P.S. This picture is of the model of the ship. 

Before the ship was taken out of the ocean in the olden days, people would use this "diving bell" to go under water and scavenge for old guns and scraps of things that could be valuable. The way it works is you would stand up in it, and the top part would keep air in it so the scavenger could breathe while the whole bell is underwater. 

The real Vasa in all it's glory!

The view from the bottom floor of the museum

The Vasa model, with all the painted things on it. On the real ship you can't see the designs because all the paint has worn off. 

View of Stockholm from across the water!

My Children with Special Needs class together in Sweden!

Okay, well that's all I have for now, folks. And for the record I did actually get an Estonian sweater, which is really fantastic and may be featured in a future blog. And Sweden was extremely soggy the first day we were there - it poured the entire time my group was on our scavenger hunt, but was perfectly sunny the next day when we spent all of our time inside learning about autism and sex offenders.

And I will leave you to contemplate this beautiful picture. Goodnight.