If there is something in the Estonian language that joins the speaker and listener more closely with the natural world, how does this appear in everyday life? I have noticed care taken to avoid expressing over-confidence, and a tendency to downplay. I have spoken at length on this topic with friends, and maybe there’s some clarity. For centuries Estonians have lived amid uncertainty, whether of the forces of nature, or among other human beings. To be definite on anything invi

As the fields roll by, and time in Estonia passes, stalky buckwheat has come into creamy flower. and the canola is fading out into green. Baby storks are half grown, and look too big for their nests. Lilac, orchid and dandelion flowers have run their course, and in the forests wild strawberries are ripe and juicy, blueberries make their appearance in forests, and cloudberries have in bogs. In one pine stand, we find enough chanterelles for a hearty dinner, and, in another, mo

This is a Soviet-era story of one man’s passion for inventing rose varieties in a country of short summers, and heavy winter snowfalls. Vello Veski wrote the definitive monograph on Estonian Roses in 1972, and his legacy runs to several recognised cultivars. Roses hold a fascination in popular culture, and among devotees the world over. Love is a red, red rose, we are told, and The Name of the Rose, a best-selling novel by Umberto Eco. In Sufi lore, love between the nightinga

As a child I would listen to our father read from the national epic, the Kalevipoeg, enthralled. The words on the page had a magic to their look and sound. Growing older, I wondered if learning Estonian would open up a new way of thinking about the world, or about life. Then on visiting the old country in 2023, it felt that such thoughts were overdone. The Estos we met are much like New Zealanders - matter of fact though cautious in their praise of others, reserved in express

At first a dozen wood pigeons or so flit about, feed on the ground, and fly in and out of trees. At this rate, the wildlife experience at Alutaguse is costing me 10 euros per bird. Then two hours of sleep after a late night, and a racoon-dog shows up. A tree stump has been covered in seeds, and this foxlike native of East Asia inches closer, sniffing the air for danger. Shortly after 8pm a young brown bear enters the stage, appearing swiftly from out of the forest. After wand

It is 7 July, St John’s Day or Jaanipäev in the Eastern Orthodox calendar. Around 100 of the Seto community mill around, setting up tables by carefully tended graves of their forebears, and preparing lunch as we arrive at an improvised car park of mown grass. The weather is fine, and it is warm when the sun shines. In this peaceful setting in a stand of birch, linden, pine, spruce, oak and aspen. it is hard to believe we are only 4 kilometres away from the border with Russia.

For the latest travel advice, I was advised to head from Pärnu southwards on the old coast road, and it’s been a magical day of wandering through berry-carpeted pine forests, boglands of dark ponds and stunted trees, straight out of a fairy tale, and along glacial erratic-strewn beaches of white sand. This time it was a botany professor at Tartu University who guided me. I had woken up that morning slightly out of sorts, my doing entirely, and if nature can revive, today’s so

Ahto Kaasik has helped put more than 2,500 sacred places on an interactive Estonian map, a massive undertaking that is unique in the world. And yet he is barely known within his own country for a task started when he was 18 years old, at times working closely with the Hiite Maja Sihtasutus (a foundation) and other institutions. I meet Ahto with friends to help translate our conversation, and before long we are chatting enthusiastically about his life and work. In ancient time

In Estonia, singer-songwriters are in the ascendant. They follow a long tradition that extends over hundreds of years, and runs to more than 1.3 million pages of lyrics in the Tartu literary museum. A 2024 outdoor concert replayed on TV on St John’s Day astonished me in the beauty of the music. A legend in his lifetime, Jaan Tätte brought in friends to sing a large and mostly original repertoire of folk music. The arrangements were spare – accordion, acoustic guitars, bass -

On arrival in Latvia’s capital, the city declares itself to be old and modern, proud of its Art Nouveau quarter, elegant and clean, planned and logical, on either side of the Daugava river, festooned with parklands, and the language is like nothing I have ever heard. As to the people, the old and the very young everywhere look alike. Among men, one type is thin and wiry; they look like a Giacometti sculpture that has had a car accident. Their asymmetric faces have strong char

A near car collision at a tricky intersection is the start to a long-arranged meeting with Valdur Mikita. He didn’t seem to mind. Parked the Yaris, and he drove us into a forest in his SUV while I told him of tracking down a rare copy of an earlier book of his, Theorem (2011). “That b/s,” he said and laughed. I had hopes of gaining the autograph of one of Estonia’s best-known thinkers and writers on the flyleaf, and felt I had to ditch the idea. The thing cost me 30 euros in

Meelis asks me why he is flying his Estonian flag at half-mast. I don’t know, and he says 14 June 1941 – leinapäev - is when the Soviets started deporting more than 10,000 Estonians to Siberia. This occurred almost a year after the Soviet invasion of Estonia on 16-17 June 1940, by secret agreement with Nazi Germany. Our grandfather, Johannes Napp, was conscripted into the Red Army, to be never seen again by our immediate family. Raising the Estonian flag at the 105th annivers

“I need a new rifle,” I say to the cashier at a petrol station. Two young women look at me astonished, and I realise my mistake. The word I want is rehv, not relv, and after we’ve sorted that out, a young man says in English to follow him to a garage where they can replace a tyre. I had arrived in Elva, a little town south of Tartu, a new place to explore, starting with how to fix a flattie. No spare wheel, no jack, but a bottle of sealant and a car battery-powered air compre

I arrive down a reddish sandy track to a campsite by a reed-lined lake, smoke still issuing from an earlier fire, and with a few birch twigs and splits, a merry, crackling fire springs to life. The perfect campsite – and it was because I was later able to drive uphill out of it. After a frantic time swapping two fun-loving Estonians at one campsite with friendly Finns at another, it’s been a day of heading south, through Tartu, deep into the Devonian geology, and rolling coun

Leaving the dance events for camping in the forest, or not quite a forest - a wooded meadow or puisniit. These spaces (for camping and wandering about in my case) are clumps of trees within large areas of grass, alternatively, forested spaces mown for hay, having a parklike feel. The puisniit asks: are humans part of the ecology? The answer to Estonians is yes. Ever since the ice sheets receded some 10,000 years ago humans have followed the fish and game, the berries and mush

Sunny and warm in the back garden, reading, and I catch in the distance the Estonian national anthem. Tiia messages me, saying there is a dance-and-choir event happening a few blocks down the road. I take a pot off the stove, quickly lock up, cross the road and through a stand of pine trees, and so it is. Hundreds are gathered and that’s just the performers: dancers in traditional costume, spinning in circles and weaving through each other, or waiting in the wings patiently f

“Until 1951 Saesaare rapids were the largest in Estonia, as well as considered the most beautiful. The rapids were a couple of hundred metres long and 30 metres wide; the water flowed at 3 metres per second. The rapids attracted both nature enthusiasts and anglers.” So says an interpretation panel titled “Saesaare power station and dam are built”, and it adds the following helpful information: the power station opened on 28 December 1952, at a 54-hectare artificial lake and a

In New Zealand, all who identify as Māori and have a tribal connection know their ancestral mountain, river, and lake / sea. In introducing oneself at a tribal meeting house, Māori recite their ancestral connection to their natural environment, cementing their status as people of the land, or tangata whenua, a distinction not available to other New Zealanders. Later arrivals must resort to explaining themselves differently. Nevertheless, in the old country, there is a chance

A day of disjointed events, pointing eventually to camping in Soomaa – the marshland – where Estonian partisans hid from Soviet troops during WWII. After packing the tent among sheltering pines in a cold wind, the Toyota Yaris heads northeast, burning through the petrol. It’s supposed to be a hybrid; in reality, I am driving 300kg of half-dead battery around Estonia. A long drive on gravel roads through gloomy spruce forest alternating with light-filled Scotch pine towards a

So much of travel is going from one city to another, leaving untouched the spaces in between, and so it is often with me. Driving from Tallinn to Haapsalu, and then to the coastal resort town of Pärnu, through forested lands. Every now and again fields appear, sown in grain or spring grass, bordered occasionally by a talu or farmstead, large buildings and smaller sheds with steeply pitched roofs, built in wood or masonry. Thanks to google navigation, some travel is on gravel