On our second day in Tallinn, we hopped on a bus north to visit Kadriorg Palace, set in a vast woodland park. The grounds were beautiful with the light dusting of snow still visible and the autumn leaves. The palace was brilliantly colored, with bright red against a pale yellow, and inside was well decorated (of course, it’s a palace). The palace was built by Russian Czar Peter the Great and Catherine, although he never got to see the finished palace. It did also have a some nice art and exhibits. Outside the palace, we walked more of the grounds and gardens.
After visiting the palace, we continued along the grounds past Peter the Great’s modest house (not kidding, it was small) and then we went to the Estonian Art Museum which had some amazing exhibits of Estonian and other Baltic artists.
For the final adventure of the day, we walked farther north along a boardwalk that hugged the Baltic Sea. Many people were out and about, running or hanging with their kids at the playground. In the distance, there was a cruise ship and other land masses as the bay curved around the city. We eventually reached the Soviet statue graveyard, where the statues of Stalin, Lenin and others have been collected from around Estonia to be a reminder of Soviet occupation. It was a bit of a haunting place.
