NYcruiser55

This might be moot for the original poster, but perhaps others will benefit from my comments. My wife and I signed up for the TJ Travel two-day Faberge Tour. Unfortunately, the weather was so bad in SPB that the ships that were supposed to leave couldn't, so our ship was stuck outside the city for one of our two days. Thus, our two-day tour became a one-day tour. My point is that TJ Travel handled this like champs. We ended up being able to cover about 75% of the original itinerary; the only thing we couldn't do was go out to the suburbs, so we missed the Peterhof Gardens and the Catherine Palace (Amber Room). Our guide Victoria was amazing. Our "standard" group had about 15 people in it, so I never felt like we lost in a cattle drive. And the Faberge Museum was absolutely fabulous - I highly recommend visiting. As far as crowds go, yes, The Hermitage is crowded, but since we got there before the official opening we were able to walk in without any wait, which makes a big difference (and don't use the cloak rooms - that will take up 45 minutes just getting your bag). The cherry on top was that TJ cut the price in half for us (one day instead of two), even though we covered much more than half of the sights.

It was obviously a long day, but definitely the highlight of the cruise. That's because of the city, of course, but also because of TJ.

Hello. We sailed on Equinox to the Med and Alaska also. The Baltics is similar to our trip last year, the British Isles.

(1) I believe they were on the 2nd and 10th nights. There was one other that had to be switched because we had a change of itinerary and this would have put a formal night on the night we were in St.Petersberg. There was some confusion and people came to dinner wearing a tux on the wrong night. All in all, formal nights were not very big and many people were not very formal. My husband brought a suit with no tie. You are just too exhausted to really care lol.

 

(2) We had mixed weather with some very cold days and then some nice sunny days. On the sunny days people were at the pool. There is also a solarium pool which people could go in on the cold days but I found it to have a pretty strong scent of chlorine for me to stay.

 

(3) We had been to Berlin before so definitely did not want to deal with that, having seen all of the main sights before. We found a wonderful tour on trip advisor by searching Warnemunde called Friends of Dave. It was a great day and I wrote a review there if you are interested. If you haven't been to Berlin before I would recommend going into Berlin. It is a very exhausting day, but you may never get the chance to do it again. Our day there was shortened due to an itinerary change but people still really enjoyed it.

 

(4) Since we had been to Tuscan and Murano several times we decided to try the new outdoor grill, I forgot the name. It was a beautiful "white night" and chilly. We were given blankets to wrap around us and there were heaters as well. I had a steak along with a shrimp and scallop skewer. The dessert was delicious. We also ate at Quisine which we had dined on last year and that is a lot of fun! On the first day of the cruise I walked over to the specialty table by Ocean View Cafe and spoke to them. I asked if there were any 1st night specials. They tried to sell me a dining package which I didn't want. I told them we wanted to eat in Quisine that night. They gave me 30% off. I then asked if we get another discount for the outdoor restaurant on another night and they offered it to me for another night.

 

Enjoy, it is a great itinerary-!

Thanks for taking the time to respond!

1) Day 2, Day 8 and one other day that was in a Today I probably left at the ship.

2) Neither. After 2 days of bad weather the weather was really nice, but not many people on the deckchairs. 80-90% was empty.

3) Unless this is your only chance to see Checkpoint Charly ever, I think you're right that Berlin is not worth it. Yet many did. We just walked around Warnemunde which is actually a very nice town. It may have been a bit more lively than usually because three days later a major regatta would take place with more than a million visitors. Warnemunde is part of Rostock, you might like to visit it (I have no idea if it's worthwhile)

4) We did visit Qsine and I've seen other tables enjoying the "experience" very much. You get an IPad with the different dishes and add the ones that seem interesting to your "Favorites". The waiter then advises on the order in which to eat them. The dishes themselves are a DIY-experience as well, like making your own guacamole. The food was very good and worth the price, but personally I prefer an old-fashioned menu more. Too much hazzle for a vacation for me, but if I had brought my 6 and 9 year old nephews I would definitely visit it again :)

Thanks for the taking the time to respond!

Thanks for doing this. My wife and I just returned from the Barcelona-to-Civitavecchia western Mediterranean cruise on the Equinox, and booked this one onboard. We've done mostly Mediterranean and Caribbean cruising (with an Alaska cruise), so this one will be very different. I wonder if you (or anyone else) could answer a few other questions?

(1) What days are the formal nights?

(2) Did people tend to hang out around the pool (especially on sea days), or was it too chilly for that?

(3) Berlin seems to be too far to be worth the trip - are you aware of any closer activities people did in Warnemunde?

(4) We really liked Tuscan Grille on the Equinox, but were less fond of Murano. Do you have any experience with the other specialty restaurants on the Silhouette? We didn't try Qsine when we were on the Reflection - is it any good?

I guess that's it for now, although I'm sure I'll have more questions later. Thanks again!