Kids in the Baltics

[james'mommy]

Has anyone every sailed with a child on a Baltics cruise? DS is 8. He's an experienced cruiser and has done the med before. He'll be old enough to remember this time. I want to make sure he has a good time. Any suggestions?

[epixx]

We have sailed the Med 3 times and the Baltics once with our kids, and the Baltics was our favorite! Our kids were 14 and 10 when we did the Baltic trip. The cities have lots of things of interest to kids. I suggest a private tour in St. Petersburg, to allow flexibility in the schedule. Of course, Tivoli Gardens in Copenhagen will be a highlight of the trip. In Warnemunde we rented bicycles in town and rode a beautiful, woodsy bike path right next to the beach. In Helsinki we visited the open air museum. We did all ports, except for St. Petersburg, on our own, in order to have the most flexible schedules. We find that the kids are very interested in certain sights (which I cannot always predict) and want to stay longer, while other sights they find less interesting so we move on. It's really easy to get around in the Baltic cities on your own.

[james'mommy]

If we go I plan on doing Tivoli. We'll be doing mainly excursions that will appeal to all of us except in St Petersburg. It's the only time I'll be in Russia so I'm going big.

[Essiesmom]

If Oslo is on your schedule, take in the Viking Ship museum, and not too far away is an outdoor heritage museum. Lots of room to run and play...If you get to Stockholm, definitely don't miss the Vasa Museum. EM

[SelectSys]

I will echo Tivoli. In addition to the viking ship museum, our kids liked going up to the top of the ski jump in Olso. We also did a very nice bike ride in Tallinn which concluded at a heritage village. Finally, the hydrofoil from St. Petersburg to Peterhof is fun for a kid as are the fountains themselves at the palace.

[Pluto_fan]

I'll be watching this thread with interest, as we are considering a Baltic cruise next summer with our children, who will be 13, 11, and 3 then. We cruised the Mediterranean with them last fall and had a great time!

 

Thanks to everyone who comments, and to the OP for starting the thread.

[lmg1230]

We sailed the Baltics on Emerald Princess August 2009 when our daughters were 12 and 6. We loved it! We spent three days prior to the cruise and one day after in Copenhagen. Our ports of call were Stockholm, Helsinki, St. Petersberg (2 days), Tallinn, Gdansk, and Oslo. We had a private tour booked in St. Petersberg which was wonderful. We did the others on our own with the exception of Gdansk - we did a ship's tour because of the distance from the port - and it was the only disappointing aspect of our trip as we didn't enjoy being herded around with a busload of people.

 

Lisa

[cruisincarly]

If Oslo is on your schedule, take in the Viking Ship museum, and not too far away is an outdoor heritage museum. Lots of room to run and play...If you get to Stockholm, definitely don't miss the Vasa Museum. EM

 

The Vasa museum is great, agree. But if you and your kids would rather do something outside, I heartily recommend Skansen (on the same island -- Djurgården), the outdoor museum and zoo. Lots of fun, space for kids to run around, etc.

 

I used to live in Stockholm -- if you have any other questions, let me know :-)

[brazilgirl]

My family loved the Baltics...an amazing trip with lots of kid friendly activities. I wrote a complete review of our trip and am including this link which details all our activities http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1024750&highlight=baltic+review

 

Skansen , the Vasa , Tivoli , the Pippi Longstocking Museum were among our favorites...

 

I HIGHLY recommend going on a private tour in St. Petersburg. We did ours with Anastasia and it was amazing. The kids loved it.

 

Have fun!

 

Kim