Part nine: Final days in Estonia


The final images I had taken while in Mooste. I'm not entirely sure why there's a wagon wheel in the top of a tree in Mooste, but there it is. And I had always gotten a kick out of the Estonian signage that fastidiously denoted the end of particular zones. This one designated the city limits for Mooste; but I couldn't help thinking it was a prohibitive sign: "No, Mooste! No urban growth beyond this line! No! Bad village!"

...and a few more sites from the Estonian power grid.

 
 
More, Soviet ruins! The top six images were of the Avangard complex northeast of Tartu, with the remaining five of the Viru complex near the northern end of Lake Peipsi. Here, both John Grzinich and Toomas Thetloff joined me in a number of recording sessions with the crumbled architectural spaces.

 
 
 
Tallinn! Fortresses and protective walls run throughout the Old Town of Tallinn, dating many centuries back. It was curious to contrast the stability of these structures against Soviet engineering, which so often used shoddy construction techniques and / or materials that the buildings didn't last more than a few decades, much less centuries. The two images on the top row to the right are of the Linnahall. Built in 1980, this is still in operation as a concert hall but has plenty of cracks and crumbles in its imposing concrete structure.