Travelling with Touropa

This European Summer we were fortunate enough to travel on a Touropa coach tour through Northern Europe. For our trip we chose the Stunning Baltics Tour which was a 7 day component within a longer tour around much of the Scandivian, Baltic & Northern European region. We joined the tour in Tallinn, Estonia to travel through the three Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia & Lithuania.

Touropa is advertised as flexible and affordable coach touring- after a wonderful tour, we can say it definitely delivers on that promise plus more.

As we soon learnt, many of the participants on our tour had joined at various different points since the tour began some two weeks earlier in Berlin. We had a very multicultural group with about 25 people in total on our 55 seater coach. There were guests from Australia, India, China, US, Mexico, Philippines & Chile. Our coach had reclining leather seats with individual usb points & a small seatback table plus a toilet available on board if needed.

Our Tour Manager was a regular on this route- multi-lingual, now living in Spain but originally from India. He ran the tour in both Spanish & English. In addition, there was another tour manager on board for the Chinese guests to assist with translation into Mandarin, specifically for them.

I will take you through the tour day by day but as a summary, for those short on reading time, the multi-lingual nature of the tour was easy. It was a very simple process of our Tour Manager explaining the next part of the day in English and then following that up in Spanish or V.V. He also provided some basic history of other destinations we stopped at on the way. However, in the major cities we always had a local guide who provided a 3 hour city tour (approx 1 hour on the coach followed by 2 hours walking) - this was also provided bi-lingually in two cities whilst in the last city our Spanish speakers were able to join another tour group from the same company which was solely Spanish speaking so we had an English speaking only city tour.

Essentially throughout our journey the tour followed a similar pattern - arrive at a destination late in the afternoon/early evening, enjoy a city tour the next morning followed by free time in the afternoon/evening and then depart the next day for the following city with sightseeing included along the way.

So let's rewind to our arrival at Tallinn airport. Our flight was an hour delayed and me being me I was worried that our transfer would no longer be waiting for us as we'd been advised they would only wait an hour. My partner, Pete assured me they will have checked for delays. As we had carry on only we were off the plane and through the arrival gates in under 10 minutes. We couldn't see anyone. We waited a few minutes and then I made a call to the transfer company number that was in the Europamundo app I'd downloaded earlier. Sure enough, the gentleman on the other end was aware of our delays and surprised we were already out and waiting. He apologised and said our driver was on the way - it was Friday evening and he got stuck in some traffic. To his word - another 5 minutes later and a driver arrived with a sign with our name on it and many apologies for the fact that he was not here when we first arrived. The transfer mini van was parked only a few hundred metres walk out of the terminal and in 20 minutes we were dropped at our hotel, The Radisson Blu.

The hotel room itself was twin beds, clean & comfortable and as the hotel was also a conference centre it was quite large and there were two restaurants, a bar and a Cafe available if you didn't want to venture out. However, there was also a great little Estonian pub across the road and a number of restaurants within 5 minutes walk. It was also only 10 minutes walk into the old town area.

There was a letter with our room key to notify us to meet downstairs at 9am for our city tour the following morning.

After a great night's sleep (with noone trying to steal the doona for a change) we headed downstairs for breakfast, which was also included. Again, as it was a conference centre the breakfast room was huge and in fact consisted of two identical large buffets at either end including a fresh egg station in the middle. Coffee was self service from an automated machine.

We waited outside a little before 9am and were a little confused as we saw a Europamundo coach but it turned out to be a Spanish speaking only coach and the guide told us the English speaking tour was separate and our tour manager would come and get us soon. Sure enough, we shortly saw our Tour Manager rounding people up and onto another coach and he checked our names off on his list of new arrivals.

Our city tour started with a one hour coach tour of the city stopping at a couple of key points outside of the old town with the local guide telling us about the history of Tallinn and Estonia along the way. We were then dropped off at the old town gate that was closest to our hotel and the guide explained how everyone can get back to the hotel from that point after the tour. Our Tour Manager also explained the meeting time for our depature to Riga tomorrow (8am). We then proceeded on a two hour walking tour of the old town looking at churches, view points, town square and the old stone walls and alleyways.

At 12pm we finished in the main Town Square where the guide then provided a few recommendations on places to eat and different ways people could walk back to the hotel (or get back to our starting place) when they wished. The rest of the day and evening was then ours to enjoy beautiful Tallinn. We wanted to do some shopping and enjoy the local markets so we headed there first followed by an afternoon of more wandering around the old town and enjoying an evening drink in the main square.

Departing at 8am, a long driving day was perfectly planned with multiple stops and lunch all included along the way so we didn't have to worry about being in the coach too long or missing out on seeing more as we travelled. On all stops we were provided with details of where and when we had to meet again and then left to explore independently. We had a morning coffee stop for an hour in Parnu followed by 30 minutes to visit the beach and then a drive across the border in Latvia to our lunch stop. A popular group touring stop, we enjoyed a three course lunch of meat & vegetable soup, Pork Schnitzel and veggies and a berry compote for dessert. Water was also included and there was beer or other soft drinks available to purchase for anyone that wanted. After that it was back on the coach to our next stop - Turaida Castle & gardens. We had a 90 minute stop there where we could enjoy the beautiful park lands and explore a bit of Latvian history around the castle itself before travelling on toward Riga and our last two stops of the day. Next was Sigulda which has a new and old palace on the same grounds that we could explore. There was no entrance ticket included here but for anyone wanting to go inside it was only a few euros or you could just enjoy the gardens if you preferred. From there it was on to the final stop, just outside the city, of a Soviet created memorial to the victims of the Holocaust - Silaspil. A memorable and interesting end to a great full day of sightseeing, then arriving into Riga around 7pm ready to find somewhere for dinner.

For the next two nights we were staying in a double room in the Mercure Hotel which was in the central city part of Riga - right next to the main train station and about a 15-20 minute walk from the old town. It was in the middle of plenty of food options - fast food just outside the hotel or a 10-15 minute walk and there were plenty of options to choose from. The hotel also offered a restaurant on site for those that didn’t want to venture far.

The next morning was another city tour where we followed a similar pattern to what we did in Tallinn. A local guide met us at the hotel and we spent the first hour touring by coach (with a few stops and short walks) around the Art Nouveau streets before arriving in the Old Town once again and spending about 2 hours exploring the history and hearing stories from our guide. We also had a 30 minute coffee break during our tour where we could enjoy sitting independently at a local cafe and people watching.

At 12pm, once again - we finished in the town square and it just started to rain! Our guide gave us information on recommended restaurants and activities for the afternoon as well as directions to get back to the hotel and once again we were left to enjoy the rest of the day and evening on our own. We chose to explore the local markets for some lunch and then came back to the old town after the rain stopped to take a canal boat tour down the river which was one of the activities recommended in the Europamundo app and by our local guide that morning. It was a relaxing way to get a different view of the city from what we had on the tour.

The following morning it was time to depart - this time at 8:30am for our first sightseeing stop on our way to Vilnius, Lithuania. We arrived at Rundale Palace and were given an entrance ticket to both the palace & the gardens with 2 hours to explore at our leisure. It is a huge complex and reminded us of some of the chateaus in France. After which, we departed on our way to lunch which was at a small local restaurant in the town of Siauliai. The restaurant itself was in an underground cellar and another delicious three course lunch was served. Today was a chicken noodle soup followed by Chicken, salad & risotto and then an apple cake for dessert. Once lunch was finished it was back on the coach with our drive continuing across the border and on to see the Hill of Crosses in Lithuania. After a 40 minute stop we travelled onwards to our final stop of the day the amazing Trakai castle - just 40 minutes outside of Vilnius. We had rain on and off for most of afternoon whilst we were in the coach and the sun came out just as we arrived at the castle, situated on an island in the middle of a lake. Once again - we were provided with an entrance ticket and a meeting time and place - and then we had 90 minutes to explore on our own. I actually could have spent longer here - especially once the sun was shining as there was plenty to see and do on a warm day including water sports, walks & enjoying the restaurants and shops along the waterfront overlooking the island castle. But we were on a schedule so it was back on the coach and on to Vilnius where we arrived at about 6:30pm at our Radisson Blu Hotel. This hotel was the most upmarket one we'd had for the last few nights and looked like it was probably recently built or perhaps renovated. We were in a king bed room and there was a lovely bar and Italian restaurant also on site, a shopping centre & casino next door and a food hall just across the road which was buzzing with young people watching the Euro Cup and enjoying the sunshine.

The next morning our city tour started once again at 9am with a local guide however as I mentioned earlier, our Spanish speaking travellers joined the other Europamundo coach after they had a few departures and therefore space for them and that meant our tour this morning was only given in English. Once again the first hour we used the coach before travelling to the old town for the remainder of the walking tour. At 12pm it was once again free time to explore independently. Vilnius definitely felt larger and more spread out with the old town more intertwined with the new. We enjoyed wandering around and even visited a cat cafe for lunch.

We departed the trip the following morning and made our own way to the airport, no departure transfers are included but it was a quick and relatively cheap uber. There were two others also leaving the tour in Vilnius but the vast majority were travelling on for their final destination as Warsaw in Poland (or returning to Berlin where the tour starts its circuit again).

We thought this tour was a perfect blend of having everything organised but not handheld. There was not a lot of time spent with your fellow travellers so other than the two shared lunches and coach trips you didn't have a lot of time to talk as all of our city tours were of course focused on the local guide explaining the destination. For travellers that want something organised but not necessarily spending a lot of time with the group itself this gave the perfect blend with lots of free time to explore independently as well. The hotels were clean, comfortable and in the case of the last one in particular, very nice indeed. We were lucky as we were travelling to places where the cities were not very spread out so that all of our hotels were situated within very easy walking distance of the old town however in larger cities there are times when Touropa would provide a coach transfer for people to travel into town for dinner if they wished, as the hotels would be a bit further out. At the competitive price being offered (currently from AUD$1289pp) we saw the entire tour as being exceptional value for what you receive and a great way to visit a destination and see the highlights.

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