Baltic Cruise aboard the Braemar

The brilliant Baltic - History, culture and modern style meet in scintillating Scandinavian cities; St Petersburg tugs at the heartstrings while Tallinn, Rostock and Gdansk intrigue.

A Baltic cruise is perfect for city lovers. In just a couple of weeks, a string of captivating capitals and intriguing historic towns – plus the star of them all, glorious St Petersburg – can all be visited with remarkable ease. Ideally choose a small to medium sized ship. You’ll dock closer to town and get ashore more quickly than on a big or mega-sized ship.

We sailed from Dover aboard Braemar, on an autumn day when an angry sea crashed against the harbour wall. But it soon calmed down, the sun came out, and fortune smiled all the way.

The Kiel Canal
Linking the North Sea and the Baltic, slicing through the verdant flatlands of Schleswig-Holstein, the 60mile-long Kiel Canal has been widened several times since it was built in the late 19th century. It’s still the world’s busiest shipping canal.

We approach the big Brunsbüttel Locks at its entrance in the late afternoon, and there’s much activity in the adjacent locks to catch our attention. It’s pleasantly peaceful sailing through the salt marshes and watching the water-borne traffic from the deck.

Braemar exits the canal in the early morning hours, but few of her passengers, tucked up in comfortable cabins, are aware of that. We wake up to find ourselves at the mouth of the River Warnow in Warnemunde, from where the ship offers a very long day excursion to Berlin.

Originally a fishing village, seaside Warnemunde with its miles of broad, pale-sanded beach, grew into a popular resort.

A green, tree-filled town, it has an evocative Old Quarter, but the most atmospheric part is Alter Strom. Lawns, flowerbeds, tempting shops, outdoor cafés and lovely old houses line the canal that’s busy with boats of all kinds. Fishermen land their catch, restaurants offer sea-fresh seafood, small sailing boats moor up for a visit.

I take the local train for the short journey into Rostock, the old Hanseatic city that survived a pounding during the Second World War and years of neglect under the German Democratic Republic, to rise again in some style.

The town centre, pedestrianised and packed with shops, has been rebuilt in the graceful, gabled architecture of Hanseatic merchant times. There’s also a wonderful collection of renovated buildings on Wokrenterstrasse leading down to the river, their façades in patterned brick or painted in cream and spice shades.

The unusual Town Hall combines a Baroque façade with Gothic pinnacles. There are step-gables, towers and spires wherever you look, and modern buildings cleverly incorporate elements of traditional architecture in their design.

The splendid churches that tower over the city are Rostock’s oldest buildings, and the interior of the soaring, 14th-century Marienkirche is quite spectacular. It holds medieval carving, an extraordinary Baroque casing for the organ, and a fascinating astronomical clock built in 1472.

A day at sea gives us the chance to enjoy the ship’s many facilities and listen to some good lectures. In the evening everyone dresses up for the Captain’s Cocktail Party and the entertainments team put on a sparkly production show.

Stockholm
Stockholm’s spire-spiked skyline and the colourful façades of waterside buildings are a visual treat. Built on islands linked by bridges, Sweden’s lively capital city is a beguiling mix of history and heritage, tradition and modernity.

The island Gamla Stan, the Old Town, has myriad narrow, cobbled lanes and a multitude of tiny shops leading up through elegant squares to the splendid Royal Palace, where there’s a smart Changing of the Guard and enough museums to keep you occupied for hours. My visit is a bit rushed, but long enough to take in the opulence and get to grips with some of Sweden’s long history.

From the Palace, I follow the road alongside a harbour of sightseeing boats and walk over to the National Museum of Fine Arts to visit a favourite Rembrandt painting.

When time ashore is limited it can be difficult to pick just one or two sights, but the Vasa Museum is unmissable.

The Vasa, a fantastic wooden warship built in 1628, sank before it had even left harbour. Brought from the deep in 1961, its story is as incredible as the ship itself, and the museum created around it is simply superb.

Braemar sails safely away under a glorious autumn sun, past red and white summer cottages and flotillas of sailing boats, winding her way among the countless forested islands of the archipelago.

Tallinn
Early next morning we’re in Estonia’s capital, Tallinn, and a shuttle bus ferries us from the dock to the walled Old Town. It’s Sunday and the fairytale city seems to be waking from sleep. Leaving the temptation of shopping until later, I climb to Toompea, the Upper Town, and take in the panoramic view over the maze of red roofs and medieval streets.

Elegant buildings reveal that this was the residential area of the clergy and aristocracy from the Middle Ages to the 19th century. The Estonian Parliament is here and there are two churches well worth seeing – the colourful, onion-domed Russian Orthodox Alexander Nevsky Cathedral and the white-painted Evangelical Lutheran Toomkirik, its simple interior hung with massive, wood-carved coats of arms.

Medieval walls, strung with fortifying towers, reach down from the hilltop heights like sheltering arms around the atmospheric Lower Town. Here, elegant colour-washed merchants’ houses line narrow streets and cobblestone squares. Café tables spill out onto the grand market square outside the arcaded, late-Gothic Town Hall. International designer labels, and quality crafts from local jewellery, ceramics, fashion and homeware designers, vie for the purse alongside Nordic sweaters and amber jewellery. Leaving Tallinn empty-handed is pretty difficult.

St Petersburg
St Petersburg stuns the senses and we have two full days to take in some of the great sights. The main cruise port where the big ships dock is a distance from the city but we’re fortunate to get a berth on the English Embankment, a mere mile or so from the Hermitage Museum and with splendid views of the palaces, museums and historic buildings that line the Neva River’s banks.

The majestic golden dome of St Isaac’s Cathedral dominates the skyline to our right; tree-lined canals and the ornate Mariinsky Theatre are mere blocks away, and the long, people- and traffic-packed Nevsky Prospekt, lined with palaces, churches, grand hotels, shops and ornate bridges, beckons provocatively.

For most of Braemar’s passengers this is a first visit and the star attraction of the cruise. A flurry of coaches carries them on city tours, cathedral tours and shopping trips, on visits to the Hermitage, an evening at the ballet, and on grand days out at the dazzling Peterhof and Catherine palaces.

After all these mesmerising sights, it’s good to have a relaxing day at sea but for those with the energy there’s a packed programme of shipboard activities, from early morning walks to late night melodies.

Gdansk
Of all the movements that brought change to Europe’s East, the one etched in memory is Solidarity, the Gdansk Shipyard workers and the tireless Lech Walesa. A morning call at the Polish port of Gdynia gives us the opportunity to visit his city and discover some of its turbulent history.

Walking through the historical centre of Gdansk’s Old Town, it’s hard to believe that it in 1945 it lay in ruins. We enter the grand square of Dlugi Targ through the Green Gate, which is actually a Dutch Renaissance palace, to see an array of tall, gabled burgher’s houses, baroque façades, rococo twirls, renaissance mansions, and a powerful bronze Neptune fountain at its centre.

St Mary’s Basilica is the biggest of Gdansk’s many churches, and can easily accommodate 25,000 worshippers! Dating from the 14th century, it houses some superb medieval works of art. The streets of the Old Town are filled with magnificent architecture, and we needed much more time to see it all.

On the drive back to the ship, we pass the Monument to the Fallen Shipyard workers, the cranes of the nearby yard forming a poignant backdrop to the three metal crosses hung with anchors and chains.

Copenhagen
Wonderful Copenhagen is our next port of call, Hans Christian Anderson’s storybook city of splendid royal palaces, verdigris spires, the magical playground of Tivoli Gardens, and the wistful Little Mermaid perched on her rock by the sea.

There are decisions to be made here. Take in some art and culture at a museum or two, visit at least one of the palaces, or shop in the mile-long pedestrian Stroget and its appealing sidestreets and squares? In the six available hours, I manage a bit of each, plus a walk through the peaceful Botanical Gardens.

Oslo
We arrive early in Oslo, which is nice, because there’s time to wander among city highlights before taking the tour to the Vigeland Sculpture Park and the Kon-tiki and Viking Ships museums. Leaden skies and threatening rain dim what would otherwise have been an impressive view from the great heights of the Holmenkollen ski jump.

Gustav Vigeland’s sculptures are extraordinary, a powerful representation of man’s life from birth to death. They’d be hard to cope with in a museum, but displaying them all in the large grassy park is ideal.

It seems astounding that the balsa wood raft on display at the Kon-tiki Museum could have carried Thor Heyerdahl and his companions across 3000km of ocean from Peru to Polynesia. Or that the papyrus boat RAII could have crossed the Atlantic. The 1000-year old Viking Ships next door look supremely elegant, and the accompanying display of woodcarvings and accoutrements is fascinating.

In the evening we’re smartly on parade to meet Braemar’s charismatic Norwegian Captain for his Farewell Cocktail Party. The crew show entertainment is terrific and the late-night Grand Gala Buffet is spectacular. One more day at sea and we’re back in Dover, disembarking with heavier suitcases and some brilliant memories.