St Petersburg tour guides

[Happytraveler2017]

Hi

 

We are going ton a Viking Cruise in May. I would like recommendations on private tour guides/ companies for a 2 1/2 day tour of St. Petersburg.

Thx so much

[LHT28]

https://boards.cruisecritic.com/forum/116-northern-europe-amp-baltic-sea/

check on the Northern Europe/ Baltic  forum 

everyone has their favourite

 

 

[Ashland]

We loved our private tour with TJ Travel...a very popular one for St Petersburg and highly recommended not only by me but many others on these boards as well. Tatyana or Julia will respond quickly once you have reached out to them via their website. Working with them was just amazing. I felt like I had a best friend in Russia planning our trip for us and it was an amazing VIP trip of a life time.

[Happytraveler2017]

thanks!

[Velvetwater]

Another vote for TJ.

 

Very friendly and professional and competitively priced.

 

We did a 2 day tour with them and a night vodka tasting tour in between the days of the tour.

[ontheweb]

I can recommend Alla who we used and SPB because they are led by the fantastic tour guide we had when we used Alla. We found what we wanted and then asked for others on our roll call to see if there was any interest in joining us. We ended up with a group of 10. We had a nice bonding experience with the others on our tour, and that number lowered the price to where it was well below that of the cruise line (Princess).

 

And going to the Baltic section to look for recommendations is a good idea/

[Murdo2012]

I can confirm that all the SPG guides are excellent. However, ours was truly outstanding!  For a St. Petersburg tour, contact Viktoria (Vika) Rother at SPB Tours and ask for their most senior Elena (blonde, tall, older lady) as Elena is a common Russian first name. Elena has an advanced degree in Russian history, has been giving tours for years, absolutely fluent in English, has taught all the younger tour guides at SPB, is an encyclopedia of information, and is treated like royalty wherever she goes. She is so well respected that her tour group goes to the front of the line at each stop. SPB prices are excellent and they give discounts for groups. We will definitely use them again.

Edited January 22, 2019 by Murdo2012
spelling

[paul929207]

We used Alla tours last summer and they were great.

[Ashland]

Most well know private tour guides are all well known....Our's from TJ Travel certainly was....VIP service wherever we went .... always to the front and escorted quickly in...real VIP service not only from her but our driver as well...just amazing !!!!

 

I think the fact that we did a private tour with just the two of us made a huge difference....well worth booking it that way and something to consider for just a few $$$'s difference.

[Canuker]

Well, I've only been to SPB once, so cannot make comparisons.
But I can tell you that, after making some pre-cruise comparisons, we selected Maxibalt as our on-land tour company.
They were nothing short of amazing. Thoroughly recommend them.
Decide what you want to see before doing anything else and get the tour that is a best fit to your needs - at your pace, too. 
Example of why I recommend Maxibalt. They arranged for us to go to the Mariinsky Theatre, where all the locals go, instead of the usual "ballet for tourists" shore excursions. The tickets were ridiculous cheap, the ballet (Mendelssohn's Midsummer Night's Dream) was fabulous. The theatre itself is astonishing. And they had a car waiting to pick us up out front and take us back to the ship. I'll never forget St. Petersburg.
My only regret: you could spend a whole month in just the Hermitage and not see everything in there. And our guide knew all the tricks and the right people - we never waited in those long lines anywhere! The Chinese and Japanese tour groups' jaws dropped!
Brilliant.

 

[Mim Lloyd]

I also used TJ Travel and agree with the previous posters, they were excellent and couldn't be faulted. They also have free WiFi in their vehicles so is great for immediately posting photos back home or to social media!

[angie7911922]

We used Anastasia's Travel. They were completely amazing. We loved the fact that we were able to tour at our own pace, and that our guide let us spend as much time as we wanted at places, while gently guiding us on to get through everything we wanted to see. She never got impatient with us. And we loved learning all the extra tidbits that she was willing to share that were not in the guidebooks. I would definitely use them again!