M/S Black Watch, a cruise vessel of Fred Olsen Cruises, visited Tallinn yesterday with approximately 700 British cruise tourists on board, reported Port of Tallinn.
The Christmas-themed tour introduced British guests with Estonian holiday season customs and provides them with an option to shop on Tallinn Christmas markets.
"The visit of Black Watch is an achievement for us, as the British have not organized cruises that far to the east in the Baltic Sea at such a time of the year”, says Sirle Arro, Head of Marketing and Communication Department at the Port of Tallinn.
Black Watch brought 655 cruise tourists to Tallinn. Most of them are from the Great Britain, however, some are from Canada, Australia, USA, Ireland, Norway, Slovakia and Thailand. The crew of the cruise vessel consists of 338 members.
The Christmas cruise for British tourists started on the last Thursday in the UK’s largest passenger port of Southampton. Tallinn is the first port of call in this cruise. The vessel stays in Tallinn from 9:00 to 16:00. Having visited Estonia, the ship went to St Petersburg and after that on the return trip will stop in Helsinki, Warnemünde and Kiel. It will return to Southampton on December 4, 2012.
During this Christmas season, the Port of Tallinn also expects Swedish cruise tourists on Birka Cruises ship. In the end of December and in early January Tallinn will traditionally become one of the destinations for winter cruises with Russian tourists operated by Tallink and St. Peter Line. The total of nine cruise ships will visit Tallinn in the coming winter, which is two more than the year ago.
Toomas Hõbemägi
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