Guides can maximize the experience

  History, foreign languages and geography may not have been your favorite subjects in school but when you are paying to visit a place, studying about it ahead of time can be loads of fun.  I think you soon realize you were not bad at these subjects.... they just were not relevant to you at the time.  Now they are.  Here are some tips to help you for the convention in Estonia and for some side trips   along the way.

 Next week tune in for cool easy to use language translation tools.

http://www.virtualtourist.com/travel/Europe/Estonia/Harjumaa/Tallinn-411828/TravelGuide-Tallinn.html  This is a very comprehensive guide to Tallinn including what to see, what to do, night life and fun things most tourists never hear about. 

http://wikitravel.org/en/Tallinn.  This is another very comprehensive web site about Tallinn including weather, history, politics, music and culture.... lots to learn if that is your thing.

http://www.ijourneys.com/  Using your IPod or MP3 this is a great way to hear what you are seeing.  Download the city you will be visiting and follow the audio guide.

Rick Steves has loads of material including audio walking tours of many European cities and sites.  http://www.ricksteves.com/

Others including The Lonely Planet and Aurtur Frommer have guides with audio podcasts of walking tours of monuments and popular European destinations like Paris, Florence, London and Amsterdam.  I understand there is also now a walking tour of Stockholm cafes and clubs frequented by the characters from the popular Stig Larson series, "Girl with the Dragon Tatoo".

There is something for every interest online these days but you might start at your local book store or library.  Amazon is also a great source of travel guides even used ones for the budget minded who may just want to tear out the pages you need and ditch the rest along.  Libraries also have a travel section with guides that you can check out for up to 3 weeks.  They also have video guides of many popular destinations.