I had a good time on this tour. Driver Victor and tour Leader Andji worked very hard to make it an enjoyable experience for all the travellers. We had about 30 people on a 50 person bus, so lots of room for everybody. A lot of people (myself also at the beginning) had the impression that the tour was tightly scripted, with attractions set up on a schedule, and time to see most of the attractions in the cities we travelled to. That's not really the case at all. This is a ""taste"" of Scandinavia and the Baltics...really, if you expect to see 10 countries in 18 days, how much time can you spend in any one place? There's a lot of time spent on the bus travelling from city to city...and under EU law, the bus has to take regular stops every few hours, many of which are at highway rest stops and other such places. So you are not going to spend all that much time touring places like Helsinki, Riga, Vilnius or Berlin...remember, you are covering 5,000 kilometers in two and a half weeks. The tour should best be understood as an ""introduction"" to Scandinavia and the Baltics....a taste of what there is, so you can decide which places you want to come back to, and do in more detail. It's a ""survey course"". I saw a lot of great places and made lots of friends. I found several countries (Norway, Sweden, Estonia) that I plan on visiting again in 2024/2025, but in more detail, spending two weeks in each one, rather than a couple of days. It seems like I am complaining but I am not; this is a great tour, we saw a lot in a very short time, and you simply cannot beat the price. Hotels vary in quality from two to four star...the good ones like the Radissons/Hiltons cost about 300 Euros a night (In asked the front desk) so Expat is getting some serious volume group rate discounts here. The poorer ones are clean and good to sleep in for a night, just don't expect fancy linens, room service, or swimming pools. Overall a great tour. I will use Expat again!
