Tallinn in 2 days, on foot

This 2-day self-guided walking plan for Tallinn covers 21 narrated sights in an easy day-by-day order. Each day is split into a morning and an afternoon loop, and every stop has a two to three minute audio story in the Gingerguide app.

You set the pace: this is a suggested order, not a schedule. Walk it in 2 days, or stretch it out. Reorder freely; Tallinn rewards a detour.

The Tallinn route at a glance

Day 1

Day 1 covers 11 stops over about 14 km as the crow flies, from St Olaf's Church to Great Guild Hall (Suurgildi hoone). ≈ 14 km between stops, straight line

Morning

1. St Olaf's Church: Estonia's tallest church, its lightning-struck spire has burned three times; its disputed legend as once the world's tallest building draws crowds, and the tower platform opens April to October. 0.2 km to the next stop
2. Fat Margaret Tower: A massive round cannon tower guarding the Great Coastal Gate on Pikk street, once a gunpowder store and prison and, since 1981, home to the Estonian Maritime Museum. 1.1 km to the next stop
3. Seaplane Harbour: A maritime museum inside vast 1910s seaplane hangars, their domed concrete roofs spanning about 36 metres; a real submarine, a seaplane replica and an icebreaker fill the halls. 5.8 km to the next stop
4. St Bridget's Convent: The towering ruin of a 15th-century Bridgettine convent in Pirita, once said to be the largest in Livonia, sacked and burned by Ivan the Terrible's troops in 1577. 3 km to the next stop
5. Tallinn Song Festival Grounds: A vast open-air arena crowned by a great arched stage built for over 15,000 singers; it hosts Estonia's Song Festival and was a heart of the 1988 Singing Revolution. 1.1 km to the next stop
6. Kumu Art Museum: The main building of the Art Museum of Estonia, opened in 2006 in a limestone-and-copper wedge cut into a hillside; it was named European Museum of the Year in 2008. 0.4 km to the next stop

Afternoon

1. Kadriorg Palace: A pink Petrine Baroque palace that Peter the Great ordered in 1718 and named for his wife Catherine I; today it houses Estonia's collection of foreign art from four centuries. 2.3 km to the next stop
2. Viru Gate (Viru varavad): Two round red-roofed towers frame the Old Town's busiest entrance, the picturesque surviving fragment of a much larger medieval gate complex mostly demolished back in 1888. 0.2 km to the next stop
3. St Catherine's Passage (Katariina kaik): A narrow medieval lane lined with old carved gravestones and open craft workshops, running beside the ruined Dominican monastery that once gave it the name of St Catherine. 0.1 km to the next stop
4. Church of the Holy Spirit (Puhavaimu kirik): A small whitewashed Gothic church that wears an ornate 1684 clock on its outer wall, and was the first in Estonia to hold its services in the Estonian language. 0 km to the next stop
5. Great Guild Hall (Suurgildi hoone): A stately 15th-century Gothic hall built for Tallinn's richest merchants and second only to the Town Hall, now home to the Estonian History Museum on Pikk street.

Day 2

Day 2 covers 10 stops over about 6.9 km as the crow flies, from Town Hall Square (Raekoja plats) to Estonian Open Air Museum. ≈ 6.9 km between stops, straight line

Morning

1. Town Hall Square (Raekoja plats): Tallinn's cobbled medieval heart, ringed by pastel merchant houses and framed by the Gothic Town Hall and the Raeapteek pharmacy that has traded on the same spot since the 1400s. 0 km to the next stop
2. Tallinn Town Hall (Raekoda): Tallinn's Gothic Town Hall has fronted the square since the early 1400s, its 64-metre tower crowned by Old Thomas, the copper guard who has watched the market since 1530. 0.2 km to the next stop
3. St Nicholas' Church (Niguliste Museum): A bomb-scarred medieval church, reborn as the Niguliste Museum, now home to church silver, gilded altars and the surviving fragment of Bernt Notke's celebrated medieval Dance of Death. 0.2 km to the next stop
4. Kiek in de Kök: A squat 1475 artillery tower whose Low German name means 'peek into the kitchen', still studded with old cannonballs and linked underground to the Bastion Passages beneath Toompea. 0.2 km to the next stop
5. Toompea Castle: The pink palace on Lossi plats fronts a fortress that has ruled Toompea since Danish crusaders climbed the hill, and now houses Estonia's parliament beneath the flag-flying Tall Hermann tower. 0.1 km to the next stop

Afternoon

1. Alexander Nevsky Cathedral: An onion-domed Orthodox cathedral raised on Toompea during Russian rule and long resented by Estonians as an imperial symbol, now facing the parliament directly across Lossi plats. 0.1 km to the next stop
2. Kohtuotsa Viewing Platform: The northern edge of Toompea offers Tallinn's classic postcard view: a sea of red medieval rooftops, church spires, the harbour and the Gulf of Finland beyond. 0.1 km to the next stop
3. St Mary's Cathedral (Dome Church): The white Dome Church is the oldest church in mainland Estonia, its interior crammed with more than a hundred Baltic-German coats of arms above a floor of medieval tombstones. 0.3 km to the next stop
4. Telliskivi Creative City: A former railway-workshop complex reborn in 2007 as Tallinn's buzzing creative quarter: hundreds of studios and start-ups, street art, galleries, restaurants and a big weekend flea market. 5.6 km to the next stop
5. Estonian Open Air Museum: A 72-hectare living museum by the sea at Rocca al Mare, where historic farms, windmills, a wooden chapel and a working tavern recreate centuries of Estonian rural life.

Distances are straight-line between stops; streets add a little.

Updated: September 28, 2026

Full Tallinn guide and all stops →