Empfire

Russia has never been somewhere I have wanted to visit. We hear so much about it in the media these days, and it’s never good news.

But that’s one of the great things about going on a cruise; you get to visit places that you never imagined you would visit!

We were docked in St Petersburg for two days and on both days we went on full-day excursions. I was going to write one big post about our time in Russia but it was getting to be a bit too long so I’ve decided to split it into two separate posts.

After Gothenburg we had another day at sea (more eating and drinking!) before arriving in Tallinn in Estonia.

Tallinn is the capital of Estonia and is perhaps most famous for it’s old town which is said to be one of the best preserved medieval cities in Europe.

Up until a few years ago I’d not heard of Tallinn, but I remember seeing someone I follow on Instagram visit there and it looked like something out of a fairy tale. I don’t know what I expected from Estonia, but that wasn’t it!

The next port of call on our Baltic cruise after Oslo was Gothenburg in Sweden.

We docked quite far out of the city centre (right by the Volvo museum) so we had to get a shuttle bus from the ship into the city. I didn’t see a single IKEA on our journey!

As with Oslo, we didn’t have a plan for Gothenburg. In fact, I really didn’t know anything about Gothenburg before visiting. Of course I now know that it’s the second largest city in Sweden and the fifth largest city in the Nordic countries. It’s located on the west coast of Sweden whereas Stockholm, the capital, is located on the east coast.