Riga 4 July

Again we did our own thing, this time with Jim and Lee. We walked into the town as the ships berth 

was very close.

It too was a medieval town, and once in the square we caught the little train for an hours tour of the town

Peter wanted to visit a museum, and that suited Lee and I as there was a small market close by. Sadly for Peter, the museum had moved but lucky for us the market was all go. Peter was bought a pressy - a Latvian bowling hat

Next stop was a pub for lunch, and after going and finding the "cat house" we made our way back to the ship - just before the rain came. A great town, and a great day

Tallin 3 July

KWe decided to do our own thing, we were so tired from the past couple of days. We got the shuttle bus into the old city ( lovely walled medieval city) and just wander around.

We succeeded in finding a coffee shop, and after we had rested off we went again.

A piece of Swedish sculpture caught our eye, and yes, now we have a bit more for the house.

St Petersberg

What a two days - we were on an organised tour - best of St Petersberg for small groups. It turned out to be such a good two days, although by the end of it we were a little over palaces, cathederals and museums.

The first day started with a canal cruise - with warm champagne . Then off to the hermitage museum - such opulence.

We seemed to do so much and see so much, it truly is an amazing place

Stockholm

In Stockholm we joined Margaret and Frank and decided we would get the hop on hop off boat and take that to see the Vasa Museum. This was a fascinating museum that was a ship that sank in 1627 and had been preserved .

The execution was absolutely wonderful, and such an education.

After seeing the museum we took the boat again and decided to walk back via the old area.

We all decided that Stockholm was a beautiful city and somewhere we could visit again.

Copenhagen 27 June 2016

We decided we would do our own thing at Copenhagen, so we set off to have a walk around. First stop was past the Little Mermaid, where we had to fight off a bus load of Asian tourists to take a photo. We then met with Jill and Rod and walked with them.

Copenhagen was delightful, and we found the area with the colourful houses, canal boats and was once home to Hans Christian Anderson.

We also found the royal palaces, but found that Mary and Fred were out for the day. We then went for a further walk to find the shopping precinct and the church Mary and Fred were married in.

All in all we had a delightful day, but were a little tired after walking a total of 12 km throughout the day.

Next stop Stockholm.

Helsinki

Again we decided to do our own thing, so got the shuttle into town to have a look around. Helsinki seemed to be not that exciting to us, but we found the markets and had a little look around.

Then it was time to find a chemist and replenish some supplies.

After that we returned to the ship

Rotterdam ( Amsterdam) 25 June

It was an early start to get to Amsterdam, an hour by coach and we were there . Our first stop was the Van Gough Museum - this was a collection of all his works, plus details about his life, and relationships with his family and other artist friends. It was very interesting but after an hour we left ( 2 hours was provided) to find coffee and have a look around outside. While doing this we saw - a man on roller blades wearing only a camouflage G string with a leather skull cap - going to fast for a photo , and table tennis tables in the park and you could rent paddles and balls.

We then rjejoined the tour and made our way to the canal cruise. This gave us a good look at some of the sights - beautiful old buildings ( some of them leaning on others to stay up), Anne Frank's house and  house boats and bicycles. One of the boats had the name - everything is fucking art.com  

The canal boats only just fit under the bridges, which are very pretty usually decorated with flowers.

After the cruise we walked to the flower market ( many stalls of bulbs and seeds), however we decided to have a well earned beer. While doing this we found some very explicit postcards - Irene bought a couple of mild ones.

We then met up with the group and went to enjoy lunch.

After lunch we found the coach, then a quick drive where we saw the Dam Square with the Baroque Royal Palace and we were ready to make our way back to Rotterdam. 

We enjoyed Amsterdam , it was a very impressive city and one that we would like to see again. I will remember it as the city of museums, as well as the usual ones we saw museums for - cheese, purses and handbags, sex, clocks and so many more.

We think it is on our list to return.