Cocaine Shots and Medieval Castles

I decided to take a little detour from my planned route. My couch surfing host, Maija, told me that it would be very easy to take a ferry from Finland to Estonia.  After researching that it would be about 48 euro and 2 hours one-way, I decided I had to do it, armed with ifonly.com tips.

Estonia is now one of my favorite locations to visit. It also helped that the day I visited was perfect. Beautiful weather, amazing places to just lay out and friendly people. I ended up staying at Tallinn Backpackers, a hostel that resided in the Old Town area of Tallinn. I then met up with another couch surfer to explore the town. Another awesome thing about Tallinn is the free WiFi that is abundant!

Afterwards, I gathered my energy to go on the hostel pub crawl. It was a sunday night, so there weren’t too many people out drinking but that didn’t stop us. The night can be summed up with one drink, the cocaine shot. Apparently (and no one told me this before taking the shot) it is absinthe and there is a specific way to drink it. In case you don’t have the pleasure of trying it, here is what you do.

The shot appears to be creme de menthe, absinthe, something that may or may not be vodka, and something else. In order to experience it correctly, you must follow this specific ritual:

1. Light the shot, hold the glass upside down over the flames until they go out
2. Place the glass over the straw in the serviette
3. Drink the shot and pour the dregs on top of the glass
4. Suck all the air out of the glass through the straw
5. Snort the dregs of the shot from the top of the glass using the short straw.

Today I feel AMAZING… no wait.. the other thing.. I feel like death hit me over the head with a snowball. Best part of it? Alcohol and …well pretty much everything is cheap! Estonia is definitely a place I’d recommend checking out and visiting.