When we were planning our vacation, one of the coolest things we discovered is that it's really easy to take a day trip from Helsinki in Finland over to Tallinn in Estonia. There's a ferry that runs right across the Baltic sea. It takes about two hours, and it only costs $20 per person. 

This was a total no-brainer for us to add to our itinerary, and we're so glad we did. Tallinn ended up being one of our favorite parts of the whole trip. 

We spent our day in Old Town Tallinn, which is the walled part of the city with some of the medieval architecture dating back to the 13th century. 

In some ways it reminded me of the walled city of Quebec, but obviously much older. It was a little bit like being in a fairy tale walking around the cobblestone streets, seeing the old churches, and wandering around the Town Square. 

We started the day in the lower part of Old Town.

We popped into some old churches.

We explored Town Square.

There's an old pharmacy here that is still open and you can check out some of the ancient cures people used back in the day to treat a variety of ailments. 

One of the cooler things we did was climb the city walls and explore some of the museums that had been set up on the old watch towers. The museums covered the historical uses of the towers as well as some of the other medieval history.

There was some eerie stuff like this plague doctor and some of these statues, which I think I heard a tour guide say were faceless monks. 

After descending from the ramparts, we headed into the upper portion of Old Town, which is where the Parliament building sits as well as a massive Russian Orthodox church.

After a day spent exploring, we grabbed a late lunch at a medieval themed restaurant, where we feasted on a massive pork leg.

We just really loved taking in all the architecture in Tallinn, which is so different than anything we see at home. 

The last thing we did in Tallinn was spend some time in a museum dedicated to Estonia's more recent and darker history as part of the Soviet Union. Under Soviet rule, one of the old houses on a main street in Old Town Tallinn had been converted into KGB prison cells. 

Now the basement of the house is open and converted into a small museum where you can see the horrific conditions in which people were held under KGB rule often before being shipped to a gulag.

Our stop in this museum was definitely a heavier part of the trip and a sharp contrast to the enjoyment of taking in the sights at street level. 

We ended our day back on the ferry to Helsinki talking about how we expected nothing else on the trip would top our day in Tallinn.

We just got back from a week-long trip visiting some of the Nordic and Baltic countries. It was an awesome -- though pretty cold -- vacation, where we admired several beautiful cities and tried a bunch of new-to-me cuisines like reindeer, elk and bear. 

We unfortunately lost our first evening in Helsinki to a horrible first day of travel. Our flight out of Baltimore was delayed 2.5 hours, which caused us to miss our connection in London, and the next London to Helsinki flight wasn't for another four hours. So we arrived in Helsinki around 9 p.m. local time instead of the 3 p.m. arrival we initially planned. 

But after putting a bad travel day behind us, we woke up to a fairly sunny morning the next day, which was perfect for exploring the city on foot. 

Helsinki is pretty small, and we found it very easily walkable. 

We started our first day exploring some of the major sites. The beauty of visiting in the winter is that there weren't a million other tourists there at the same time so nothing was overly crowded. 

Our first stop was Senate Square, home to what is perhaps Helsinki's most famous landmark, this massive Lutheran Cathedral. 

It anchors the other buildings in the square, which include university buildings, the government palace and the national library, all of which were built by the same architect in a similar style in the 1800s. 

The art inside of the library was especially beautiful (and apparently some of the best non-ecclesiastic interior architecture in the country, per the one of the guidebooks I read).

From Senate Square we took a stroll over to Katajanokka, a quieter island neighborhood that's home to a large Russian Orthodox church as well as beautiful architecture along quaint streets. 

As we were walking over the bridge to the island, a friendly local man pegged us as tourists on a stroll and offered to show us around the neighborhood. He walked with us for probably 30 minutes, pointing out some of the different buildings and key landmarks. He also provided some colorful commentary on some of the historical and more recent changes in Finland. 

After we parted ways, we stopped in to visit the Russian Orthodox church and take in its ornate beauty. 

We finished our morning stroll looping past the archives and the national bank of Finland before heading to the Central Market along the water for lunch.

Our local friend highly recommended the salmon soup, which I'd also seen recommended on several Helsinki travel blogs. So after checking out the multiple market vendors, we settled in with a big bowl of delicious soup.

With some hearty fuel in our bellies we set out to explore Suomenlinna, an island fortress that's about a 15-minute ferry ride from Central Market. 

This fortress was originally built by the Swedes to protect against the Russians, but it eventually came under Russian control (like all of Finland), until Finnish independence in 1917. 

Now the island is a UNESCO World Heritage site. We spent the afternoon exploring the old fortifications, walking along the sea and checking out the bunkers placed throughout the island. 

Of course, while we were on the island, the wind really started to pick up and it got quite chilly despite the sun. 

Our day concluded with a visit to the sauna before heading out to Restaurant Savotta back at Senate Square for dinner. This might have been my favorite meal of the whole trip where we got to try a whole variety of traditional Finnish dishes. 

Our appetizer platter featured traditional food from land and sea. This is where we tried bear for the first time. Ben got the reindeer and I got the lamb for our entrees. I was surprised the reindeer wasn't nearly as gamey as I have found venison in the U.S. to be. 

On the way home, we picked up some Frazer chocolate for dessert to end our first day on a sweet note. 

I think I may have only read two books in the month of February. I felt like I blinked, and the month was over. But when I look back at my calendar, I'm trying to figure out what exactly I did.  Yes there was the Super Bowl, which the Eagles sadly lost, and we had an incredibly busy President's Day weekend, but beyond that, I think I was just largely uninspired by the books I had been reading, and only managed to find two this month that I actually enjoyed. 

And oddly enough, they were both witchy romances. I stumbled down this category books after a discussion at a past book club on how witchy books were really taking off. So I read two of them in February, and honestly found them both pretty enjoyable.

Four Stars

The Very Secret Society of Irregular Witches by Sangu Mandanna
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Witches in Great Britain follow a certain set of rules to remain undetected by the regular population, most importantly, keeping their heads down and not mingling with other witches. But then Mika gets a job opportunity to train a group of young witches living in secret together on a far-flung farm. She takes the job because she needs the money, but is constantly worried about the repercussions. Over time she finds herself growing found of her charges. Throw in some surly normal people that live on the farm with the witches. Things get dicey as spells go off the rails and Mika has to navigate it all. This was another enjoyable and cozy read.

The Kiss Curse by Erin Sterling
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was a cute follow-up to the Ex Hex that I read back in the fall. Set in the same magical town, featuring a similar set of witches. One witch loses her magic when a newcomer arrives in town, but it's not immediately clear why. As she tries to figure it out, she's also faced with a pack of witches attempting to do some dark magic. Meanwhile, she finds herself falling for a sworn enemy. Definitely a fun and light read.

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