Jump to content
Cruise Critic Community

Land O'Lubber

Members
 View Profile  See their activity

  • Posts

    2

  • Joined

 Content Type 

Posts posted by Land O'Lubber

    Riga Port Info - Specific to Royal Caribbean

    in Northern Europe & Baltic Sea

    Posted

    We will be sailing with a group of friends this summer on the 7-Day Baltic Cruise on Royal Caribbean’s Serenade of the Seas. Some of our group became concerned about transportation in Riga, based on some posts last summer from Royal Caribbean’s passengers indicating that the ship does not dock near Old Town, but instead docks quite some distance away:

     

    http://www.cruisecritic.com/memberreviews/ports/riga-cruises/

     

    http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=2233908&highlight=riga

     

    http://www.cruisetimetables.com/cruises-to-riga-latvia.html

     

    The RCI website is beautiful but unhelpful, and it doesn’t give much in the way of specific information about Riga. Most websites (including CruiseCritic) and travel books indicate that cruise ships dock within walking distance of Old Town.

     

    Our travel agent spent 45 minutes on the phone with RCI customer service trying to answer the question of exactly where our ship would dock. At the end of that time, he was told that we would be within walking distance of Old Town. When he asked if she was sure, she replied, “That’s what I’ve been told.”

     

    Another member of our group called customer service directly and was given a more circumspect answer along the lines of, “Sometimes the ship docks close in and other times not.” He was unable to get a direct answer about where Serenade of the Seas would be docking for our cruise.

     

    Then we discovered the following website operated by the Port of Riga, showing where ships will be docking this summer:

     

    http://www.rop.lv/en/ferries-and-cruise/cruising/cruise-vessel-schedule.html

     

    It shows that all the cruise lines EXCEPT for RCI’s Serenade of the Seas will dock at “RPT” (Riga Passenger Terminal), which is very close to Old Town. Serenade of the Seas will dock at “KS” which stands for Krievu Sala, a lumber port 12km away from Old Town.

     

    The following website helped explain the reason:

     

    http://www.cruiseeurope.com/news/riga-hosts-cruise-europe

     

    It lists the limitations of the Riga Passenger Terminal as length: 290m, and draft: 8m. The KS terminal has no draft restrictions. According to the information online, Serenade of the Seas has a length of 293m and a draft of 8.5m.

     

    So, just a heads-up to our fellow cruisers on RCI: be prepared to take a (previously unexpected) extra shuttle ride in Riga.

×
×
  • Create New...