Afternoon bus through Estonia to Tartu

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(the article below accompanies this video)

For the second morning in a row here in Tallinn, Estonia, I woke up with a low blood sugar. This time, however, I didn’t want to know what it was, so I didn’t check; I just drank juice. This was a flagrant violation of the t1dwanderer.com credo of “always check!”.

We woke up late to catch our bus to Tartu, a city in the southern part of Estonian. (The alarm on Masayo’s phone was set for the wrong day.) We still had plenty of time to get there, just not enough to get breakfast anywhere.

It was -3ºC outside and we were bundled up tight, carrying our various bags through the streets that led to the big bus station (Tallinna Bussijaam; how I love the Estonian language with its frequent double letters!). At the station they have little touchscreens where you can input your ticket numbers and get printouts to show the driver (we paid yesterday online). Very nice — well done again, Estonia!

We got coffee and some water bottles at the station — again, as on the ferry from Mariehamn to Tallinn, our coffee cups were only half-filled. Still cost full price though. We also got some pastries to eat on the bus.

On the bus to Tartu and first BG check of the day

We put our big bags in the storage compartment underneath the big highway bus and got on and sat in our assigned seats. I checked my blood sugar for the first time today — 155. It was 10:30 am. Not too bad, I thought.

I shot up the Humalog and ate my pastry, which was very crumbly and messy. Masayo reported that her fruit pasty was very good and even seemed fresh, although it came from a bus station cafe. Will Estonian wonders never cease?

The ride to Tartu was our first look at Estonia, and the Baltics, outside of Tallinn. It was mostly flat, with fields and trees passing lazily by. The sun was in my face the whole time, but despite that — and despite the fact that the bus had free wifi — I enjoyed looking out the window and watching cheerful Estonia go by.

In Tartu, I didn’t see a map at the station but I thought I vaguely remembered the way to the hotel I’d booked online. So we set out walking in what I hoped was the right direction. It was early afternoon, clear, sunny, and cold.

It turns out I was mostly correct. I had to approach a woman at a bus stop and ask about the location of our hotel; she pointed down a road. A small brush with a local; traveling with Masayo means that these are more rare than they would be if I were traveling alone.

But the helpful lady was right; soon Masayo and I were at the Aleksandri Hotell.

Aleksandri Hotell

Our room was nice, and the hotel itself was nice too. Small, cheap, and pleasant. The only problem is that there wasn’t much around — no restaurants, not even in the hotel. The room had a refrigerator though, our first on this trip. I put some of my insulin in it just for kicks. It’s been cold enough outside that I haven’t worried about insulin coolness so far.

We did find a big Rimi supermarket and got some lunch there. They had a salad bar full of meats and stuff so that became our lunch. Along with a small pizza and a cinnamon roll from the bakery.

Unfortunately when we got back to the room to eat, my BG was 50. Too much insulin for my bus pastry. I ate, slowly, kind of out of it, but an hour later I was 240 so I took a little insulin — too little, I thought (4 units), but we were planning on walking so I thought it might be ok. (I inject in my legs so walking soon after a shot often brings it down quickly.)

I also noticed that after riding in the bus storage compartment, my bottle of Dr. Bronner’s Magic Liquid Soap had turned cloudy and opaque. Uh-oh. This is the only soap I brought, and it also serves as toothpaste, laundry soap, and shaving cream. And it’s all-natural (my skin has not been dry even hanging around out in the cold every day like I do) and it’s not readily available. Masayo said it would be better after it warmed up; I wasn’t so sure.

Walking around Tartu

Anyway we went walking through town. The KGB Cells Museum was already closed for the day, though the door was open and I did get a quick peek at the cell doors in the downstairs hallway before we turned around and left. We made vague plans to come back when they were open — but how could it possibly be as good as Patarei prison in Tallinn?

We continued to the Estonian National Museum, which was open. We paid to see both the permanent and temporary exhibitions which were really interesting. They told the story of the original settlers in the Estonia area, and also about Estonians fleeing to Finland and other places during World War II. Masayo saw a book on knitting in the gift shop but at €25 decided not to get it.

Low blood sugar again

Outside, I felt a little funny and sat down at a bus stop to check my BG — for the second time today it was 50! I was angry, and a tad worried — it wasn’t making sense. I ate a Snickers I bought in Sweden a few days ago and we walked home. I couldn’t explain why I was so low, then high, then low. I never expected to be 50. But indeed I was; I could feel it.

Dinner from the supermarket, mm-mmm!

Later, in the room, I was 197, my Dr. Bronner’s soap had regained its usual translucency, and it was time for dinner. But since there was nothing around (something next door looked more like a club or bar than a restaurant, and there was no menu posted so we didn’t go in) we went back to the Rimi supermarket. We had no cooking facilities so we had to eat cold food. Not unusual for me, but Masayo didn’t have much taste for it. We got packaged sandwiches, potato chips, and water, and I got a Cinnamon Toast Crunch knock-off and some milk to snack on the next couple days. (At least, I hoped it was milk. There was no English on the carton.)

I enjoyed my carb-heavy meal too; it was actually kind of nice to have something uninteresting after all we’d been eating. After dinner we each did a few loads of laundry (with our respective showers) with the Scrubba, and strung up our clothesline between two chairs stretched across the room.

The only problem was that I had terribly mishandled the cereal and my low BGs — I was a whopping 338 at 11:00 pm. Perhaps it was a fitting end to a day of bad roller-coaster readings.

I took some corrective Humalog, plus my Lantus, and went to sleep, hoping for better BG tomorrow.

Have you ever stayed at a place that had no food facilities around it? What did you do?

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