Rakvere family vacation

Hey everyone!


It's already april and spring is on its full swing! :) Not that the weather is great here in Finland where it rains, snows like crazy but sometimes it even shines through the clouds. Anyway, it is time to tell about our recent vacation to Rakvere, Estonia. (The link goes straight to Ikaalisten matkatoimisto's site where you can book your own trip to Rakvere).
We started our trip with a ferry that was included in the price, and we also had our car with us. The ferry takes about 2 hours to get from Helsinki to Tallinn, and we travelled with the super fancy new boat called MS Megastar. Not only the process of driving your car to and from the ferry works as it should, the ferry is so clean, modern and it has two things families travelling with kids need: a playroom and Burger King ;) You know, first your kids get to run around in a safe playarea and just before you have to leave the boat and get in to your car, you eat something fast (because kids are still at that running-around-like-crazy -mode) and then you get in to your car. And guess what? They both fall asleep asap. Job done!! And for those travelling without kids, the ferry has restaurants, coffee shop, bar and a few stores. I didn't get to go there (because I was with my kids) but I hear the stores are great.
So now the ferry ride is over and you're on your way to Rakvere which is about 1,5 hours from Tallinn. You do need to eat on the ferry or have snacks with because there are no restaurants on the way there. None, or at least we didn't spot any. 1,5 hours is such a short way so that didn't bother us at all and soon we arrived to Rakvere, which is a super small town (5th biggest (or smallest) towns in Estonia). It does have the biggest mall in Estonia, Pohjakeskus, and it is worth the visit. It even has an indoor playarea for little kids which is nice if it rains non-stop and you just don't see yourself spending much time outside :) Shops, restaurants, etc. all in there.

Aqva hotel

We stayed at Aqva hotel which is like 'the' hotel in Rakvere with the spa, gym, restaurants, modern and neat rooms, and a huge playroom for kids. I gotta say, we loved it!! The spa area with all the pools and different saunas is just something for a relaxing holiday with little kids. Everything's so clean and tidy, and we didn't see any drunk people at any time so very safe for families travelling with kids.
Our hotel room was nice and modern but unfortunately it was way too small for us. You know, it was just the room and bathroom - nothing else. That obviously wasn't the hotels fault at all so next time we travel we're gonna pick a large hotel room.

Rakvere

As said before, Rakvere is a small place but it has absolutely great restaurants. The thing that I love about estonian restaurants and kitchen is that they have variety compared to finnish restaurants: every restaurant had that 'it' thing with a special interior and they put an effort on even a salad! I mean, a ceasar salad is just a salad but in Estonia they added something special to it. Every restaurant we went to had also a playarea for kids - perfect! I mean, I get to eat my entire meal and kids were free to play when they were finished.
There was a smaller mall also with small clothing and sport shops, pharmacy and a huge grocery strore called 'Selver' where you get to buy your daily essentials (and wine too :D).

Conclusion

We wanted to find a cheap but fun and effortless vacation for the 4 of us and we didn't wanna fly since that's too hard with little ones. A spa works everytime, a playroom is a nice bonus and walkable streets were a must. Shopping and great restaurants were beyond of our expectations so all in all, this was a dream vacation for us. Would we ever go back? Absolutely. To see more pictures of our trip, please visit my workandbabies instagram :)


Hope this post helped someone who's thinking about their next travels! Have a great day! :)