The apex of excitement is found in the Raekoja.  The Town Hall Square has been the beating heart of life in the Estonian capital since the 11^th century when it was a thriving marketplace.

It has the same role today as the much photographed massive square is ringed by tiny shops and gourmet restaurants that have delicious views of the imposing Town Hall, the only surviving Gothic town hall in northern Europe.

An illustrated feature on the Old Town of Tallinn can be written on assignment from 1000 to 2000 words, depending upon editorial requirements. 

A feature or sidebar can also be written about the unique cultural attractions on the other Baltic capitals of Vilnius and Riga.

Diu Island in Gujarat, India has a history going back even further. It is said that in the era of Satyuga (between two and three million years ago, a time when “the gods walked the earth”), a certain King Jalandhar ruled over the island. According to legend, he was a real bad dude, and accordingly was disposed of by the aforesaid gods.

In Estonia, the ancient culture of Hiiumaa Island was home to the “Mad Baron” von Ungern-Sternberg.  He is said to have led troops in Mongolia, treating the Mongols with “unparalleled savagery”. Eventually, in 1921, Ungern-Sternberg was handed over to the Bolsheviks for execution. Even today teachers at Suuremõisa College (the baron's former manor) and electricians working on the manor house claim to have seen or heard his ghost.

What, if anything, do these three widely separated islands have in common?                                                           

Time to pick my way back down to street level. But as I turned, I found the spiral staircase enveloped in darkness. The door where I had entered the tower was firmly locked, and so was the massive oak door further below, at street level.

Trapped!

Workers restoring the minaret-like needle of Tallinn's fourteenth-century town hall had locked up as they left. “Hello, hello, tere, tere… “, but my entire Estonian vocabulary could not draw a response.

Released eventually, I dusted myself off and retreated to the nearest of many café-bars, overshadowed by the bulk of northern Europe's last surviving medieval Gothic town hall.

Down through the centuries, the history of Tallinn is a tortured tale of the ebb and flow of empires; of quiet prosperity interrupted by yet another battle. Earlier captives than myself had been confronted by the torture rack; equally frightening was the grotesque black canvas costume with its fearsome hood and pointed snout, shrouding the medieval physicians as they dealt with the victims of plague.  

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