Rakvere

Its earliest signs of human settlement date back to the 3rd-5th century.

Nowadays, Rakvere is an attractive and rapidly developing town with quite an interesting character. The modern Rakvere perfectly reflects the phenomenon of the Estonian province: with visible lowliness and calm, a turbulent cultural life flows here. Every day there is a play or a movie in the theatre, there are a lot of cafés and restaurants in the city, and the architecture is diverse and quite original.

Rakvere is the place where the first Estonian Punk Song Festival took place. It’s also the host to the well-known international rock music festival “Green Christmas.” Since 1994, a biannual international theatre festival, called Baltoscandal has taken place in the unique, friendly and slightly crazy atmosphere of Rakvere. The city is also known in Estonia for its youthful hip-hop and electronic music scene. So it’s no wonder, that the motto of Rakvere is “full of power”.

1 Tourist Information Centre, Laada tn 14, ☏ +372 324 27 34, fax: +372 324 27 34, rakvere@visitestonia.com. Mon-Fri 09:00–17:00 (break 13:00–14:00). When closed, a sign on the door suggests to take a look at the printouts of the city maps, posted in the window to the right of the entrance.

Bus and train schedules are easily available online – read more under Estonia#Get around.

By bus:

1 Rakvere Bus Station, Laada 18a. 06:45–20:00. Modern glass pavilion with benches, cash desks and R-kiosk. The schedule is displayed above the ticket offices, so it can be read directly from the street. However, it is arranged in a completely mysterious way, contrary to any principles of design and structuring of information.Rakvere has regular bus connections to Tallinn (every hour, 1.5 hr), Tartu (every two hours, 2 hr 10 min) Narva (every two hours, 2.5 hr), Jõhvi and to a number of other cities.

By train:

2 Rakvere Railway Station, Jaama 6a (1 km to the north-east of the city centre). The building of the station is actually a shop, so you might believe that no trains go from here. Unfortunately, the original building of the station in Rakvere was not preserved.Edelaraudtee runs a Tallinn-Narva train twice a day, which stops in Rakvere, and another train just to Rakvere (1 hr 20 min). With their help you can come to the city in the morning and return to Tallinn in the evening.GoRail also operates the Tallinn-Moscow line, which also stops in Rakvere.

By car:

Rakvere is a short distance from the Tallinn-Narva road and the Rakvere-Pärnu road #5. Tallinn 100 km, Narva 116 km, Tartu 133 km.