Today was a pretty damn busy day, but really interesting. Tallinn had made a really good impression on us very quickly and after today nothing had changed. After breakfast I went to withdraw some money at an ATM (more on this later...) and we headed about twenty minutes outside of the old town, to Patarei Prison.

Patarei was originally built in the mid-19th century as a defensive fortress (it's right on the southern shore of the Gulf of Finland, but after some years it was converted into a prison, and was used for that purpose over the next century or so by a number of different groups who controlled Estonia - including the Soviets, and the Estonians themselves. In fact, it was only closed down in 2002, which if you see how it is will probably shock you a fair bit. Today it's a museum; but not one of those super-clean, thick glass windows and interactive displays kinda thing - it looks like the day it was shut down people just literally turned the lights off and walked out the door, and it hasn't been touched since. The place was gloomy as, no doubt about it. The ticket office consisted of one person hanging out in a dirty old minivan. There was razor wire lying around in random places, things were dark and dusty (we had to use the light of our phones for half of the rooms), and random old crap was lying around everywhere. Amongst some things we saw included an execution chamber - the walls were painted brown in order to diguise bloodstains - and a room with a series of hollywood posters of movies from the mid-90s. The icing on the cake was a trendy cafe and a small beach (complete with deckchairs and everything) we found at the back of the prison complex. I can't say I've been to many beaches before where the sand and water are separated by a big barbed-wire fence. Not a whole lot about Patarei made sense, but I have to say that it added, rather than detracted from the experience.

After returning to the Old Town from Patarei, our next activity was visiting the underground bastion tunnels that exist underneath the Old Town. The tour of these tunnels was really interesting, in that they helped explain an awful lot about the history of the city. Over the centuries the extensive tunnel system has been used for a variety of purposes: first for assisting with the defense of the city, then at various other points it has been used as a prison, a bomb shelter, a refuge for the homeless (who not long ago virtually had sovereignty over the tunnels. If the police visited, for example, they would first have to knock on the door and ask to come in), as well as place for punks to secretly be punks in the time of the Soviet Union and early 90's. At the end of the tour there was some kind of 'Tallinn in the year 2200' exhibition thing which was a bit cheesy and retarded, but I'd read about it before going on the tour so I was expecting it and it didn't really take away from the experience. As part of the tour e also went above ground to the Kiek in de Kök (peep in the kitchen) tower, the highest one along the walls of the Old Town. There was a small museum inside with more history of the city, as well as a good view so we smashed out a few photos.

It's at this point that I will come back to the ATM. Needing to withdraw again after Kiek in de Kök, I went to another ATM... only to realise my bank card was missing from my wallet! After thinking/panicking over the question for a while I realised that I probably left it in the ATM in the morning (it made sense because I still had my wallet and everything else associated with it). I also remembered that I had withdrawn twice in a row (after realising I hadn't withdrawn enough), and therefore I probably thought in my head I'd already taken the card on the second go. I was absolutely furious with myself. I may be stupid sometimes, but one thing I don't do is lose my valuable stuff - in all my previous travels I'd never done something like this. At least I had another bank card, but the one I lost was fantastic for travelling because it didn't charge fees to withdraw at foreign ATMs. My other card was the complete opposite. Now I would have to withdraw larger amounts to avoid excessive fees (yet still get stung a fair bit), and it would also make it more difficult later in the trip when I would visit more non-eurozone countries. I actually cared less about the little bit money I had in the account than the card itself. To top it off, the bank had closed just before I realised I didn't have the card anymore. Still... I guess if that's the worst thing that happens on the trip, it's not the end of the world.

At that point there was not much else I could do, therefore to cheer me up a bit Mari took me to a traditional Baltic place for some Elk soup, which was really good. On the way back to the hostel we found some ginger beer.... GINGER BEER! Seriously, of all the things I missed about Australia, ginger beer was right near the top. I haven't been able to find that anywhere in Spain unfortunately, and had been getting cravings for a while. So ok, I lost my bank card, but at least I had ginger beer.

Back at the hostel a group of people gathered around the TV with us to watch the Brazil vs Chile match (World Cup quarter-finals). Brazil just managed to win on penalties, and for a moment - if only a split second - Mari seemed to give a s*** about football.