Peterhof Palace or Catherine's Palace????

[Beally]

I will be on the Constellation this summer and have been researching the three major tour guides in Russia. The only difference that I notice is Alla goes to Catherine's Palace and DenRus goes to Peterhof Palace? Does anyone have feedback on which Palace is the "must see". Thanks everyone!

[ItaliaBella]

I won't be going to St. Petersburg until July 2008 but I've already corresponded with Alla Tours and they said for my party we can do both. I gave them a list of places we want to see and they said that they can arrange it so that we are able to see all the places we want to see. Here is what they said they can do for my party in 2 days: Catherine's Palace, Winter Palace/Hermitage, Yusupov Palace, Peterhof Palace, Peter & Paul Fortress, St. Isaac's Cathedral and Church of the Savior on the Spilled Blood (not in that order). Just ask them and they will customize it for you.

 

The only difference I can tell you - is that Peterhof Palace is the Russian Versailles. It's gardens and fountains are also a must see at the Peterhof Palace. Catherine's Palace has a treasure inside - the Amber Room. I'm going to see both because who knows when I'll come back to Russia. I want to make the most of it, if it is the only time I ever go there.

[Jana White]

They are totally different. If possible, I would do both, but if I liked gorgeous fountains, and beautifull landscape I would go the Peterhof, if I liked beautiful rooms, I would do Catherines.

[Morgans]

The setting of Peterhof is magnificent, as well as being spectacular inside. I would go for Peterhof - but it is really a difficult choice as they are both well worth seeing.

[qm2lover]

hi,

 

I've noticed that some of the 3 main tour agents for St. Petersberg do not always offer an inside tour at Peterhof.

 

Please could anyone tell me what the inside of Peterhof is like, is it worth seeing? I would have thought that having taken all that time to get there it would be worth having a look inside and say forego lunch.

 

Thanks

 

 

Heather

[dog]

We have planned our two day tour with Red October and was able to include both of these palaces. I also specified that we go inside them and visit the grounds/gardens/fountains.

They were very accommodating in doing so.

[Beally]

Thanks for the feedback. I am not customizing my own tour but deciding between Alla's "stenuous" tour or Denrus "value tour" so I have to pick one of the palaces. Neither tour stops at both.

[Coral]

I was just at both last week.

 

If you like being outside and see wonderful fountains - pick Peterhoff. If you prefer a beautiful palace, choose Catherine's palace.

 

Does your Peterhoff include a palace and if so, which one? I have done 2 different buildings at Peterhoff and the large palace is very nice but I didn't think the smaller one was that great.

 

I personally preferred Peterhoff.

[Steamboatin]

We visited St. Petersburg last Spring on the Celebrity Constellation. We had a Roll Call here on CC and one person arranged group rates for us all with Red October.

 

Here is what we did in our 2 days in St. Petersburg. Almost 24 hours of touring in those 2 days. Now that is hard to beat, also hard to do. But we enjoyed it.

 

From my cruise journal:

 

St. Petersburg, Russia

Friday, May 26 and Saturday May 27, 2006 and started at 7:30 a.m. first day, 7:00 p.m. boat tour, and 8:00 a.m. second day.

Shore Excursion Name: Complete Tour of St. Petersburg, Russia, Country Palaces and Boat Tour on local rivers with dinner and Russian folk life entertainment.

Russian Independent Tour Company: Red October

http://www.redoctober.spb.ru or email: rols@redoctober.spb.ru

Approximate Duration: 16 Hours first day and 8 hours second day.

Tours for two days were taken with a Russian private tour group known as Red October. The first day in St. Petersburg we toured various historic sites by van. On the evening of the first day we enjoyed a canal boat ride through the Moika River and canal system of St. Petersburg while enjoying a special dinner aboard the canal boat and listening to special entertainment. The second day was another day of historic touring with Red October prior to joining our cruise ship for a late afternoon sail a way from the city.

On the first day the tour started at 7:30 a.m. at the pier. The group of 38 passengers boarded two minivans owned by the Red October tours of St. Petersburg, Russia. We than drove through the City of St. Petersburg and drove by St. Nicholas’s Church, Theatre Square with Marinsky Theatre, St. Isaac’s Square, majestic St. Isaac Cathedral, the bridge of the ‘Bronze Horseman’ which is the most famous monument to Peter the Great, Shmidt Bridge, Vasilievsky Island with Arts Academy, Menshikov Palace, Kunstkamera, ‘Streka’ with Stock Exchange and Rostral Columns and with the most beautiful view of Neva Embankments Winter Palace and other buildings of the Hermitage Museum, Twelve Colleges, Palace Bridge, Palace Square with Winter Palace and Alexander Column, Admiralty, Nevsky Avenue which is the central street of the city, Smolny Cathedral and Smolny Institute. “Field of Mars”, we drove by the Savior on the Spilled Blood Cathedral, Trotsky Bridge, Peter’s the Great Cabin and the Cruiser “Aurora”.

We than made an inside visit of Peter and Paul Fortress which is where the city was founded in May of 1703. Inside of the Fortress we visited the Peter and Paul Cathedral which was built during the period of 1712 and 1733. It is the burial place of the Romanov family.

This was followed by a stop at the Red October’s Shop where we paid for our tours and did some souvenir shopping.

From there we drove to the Yusupovs’ Palace on the Moika River embankment. The Palace is one of four the Yusupovs’ had in St. Petersburg. The Yusupovs’ family was one of the richest families in Russia in the XIX Century. The Yusupovs’ were related by marriage to the Romanov's. The last owner of the palace Felix Yusupov was married to Irina, niece of Nicholas II. Yusupovs were famous Maecenas and their theater was the most popular of the private theaters in St. Petersburg.

Inside the Yusupovs’ Palace we saw very unique musical instruments in the gala rooms and the living rooms of the Palace. The Palace had its own Golden Theater which was a copy of the Bolshoi of Moscow. The most famous actors, dancers and singers considered it an honor to perform on this stage. Performers such as bass Fiodor Shaliapin and world famous Anna Pavlova among others performed here. We than visited the cellar where in December 1916 Felix Yusupov, Grand Duke Dmitry and other monarchists and conspirators murdered Grigory Rasputin the morose and mysterious figure in Russian history.

Following the tour of the Palace we boarded the minivan and ate a box lunch while we drove the 30 km or 19 miles west of St. Petersburg to Peterhof. There we visited the ‘Russian Versailles’ the official Summer Residence of the Russian Tsars. We had a leisure stroll through the ‘Lower Park’ with its 150 fountains, cascades and various pavilions and palaces. The facility was adorned with gold leaf on many of the garden items. Within the Summer Residence we toured the Monplaisir Palace which is built on the very coast of the Baltic Sea. The Monplaisir Palace was the favorite of Peter I and the Palace is preserved in the memory of the greatest of the Russian Tsars and illustrating his private life style. Following the tour we than drove back to the pier where we once again went through Russian Customs prior to boarding the Constellation for a rest break.

Later that evening we once again went through Russian Customs and boarded a Red October minivan for a White Nights folklore ride and dinner on a river tour boat on the Moika River and Neva River of St. Petersburg. We toured the waterways of St. Petersburg for approximately two and a half hours while enjoying Russian entertainers performing, singing and dancing to Russian folk music while dressed in Russian style folk dress. The Russian dinner consisted of an appetizer, Salmon fish baked in foil with cooked vegetables, a vegetable salad, white wine and a shot of vodka. We arrived back at the Constellation after 11:00 p.m. after once again clearing Russian Customs. It was still twilight upon our return to the ship at that late hour of night.

On the second day of our visit to St. Petersburg the city was celebrating its 303 birthday with a massive parade. In the parade there were numerous military marching units, military bands, citizen based bands, marching groups and decorated truck floats. Overhead to blimps flew with each carrying a huge flag below them. One blimp carried in display the Russian flag and the other the flag of St. Petersburg.

On the second day we departed the Constellation and Russian Customs at approximately 8:00 a.m. and proceeded to once again tour parts of St. Petersburg. We departed the harbor area and headed to Tsarskoye Selo. We rode for 25 km or 15 mile drive south of St. Petersburg. Tsarskoye Selo was the official residence of the Russian Tsars. Upon arrival we visited the Catherine Palace. It was built by Peter I for his wife Catherine I and later re-built and enlarged for their daughter Empress Elizabeth by Italian architect F. B. Rastrelli. The striking luxury of the interior decoration of the palace was created and crafted by the best artists of XVIII and XIX centuries. We toured the interior of the palace with the highlight being the Amber Room with its walls paneled with amber. During WWII it was completely destroyed and lost. It has since been restored to its original beauty and opulence. Following the tour of the palace we toured the beautiful Catherine Park with its many gardens, pavilions, marble statures, statues, ponds, canals and smaller palaces along with its unique outer wall of living quarters and workshops which make up the outer wall. We enjoyed a box lunch on the drive back to St. Petersburg.

Once back in St. Petersburg we visited the inside of the Savior on the Spilled Blood Cathedral that was built in 1907 as memorial church to honor Russian Emperor Alexander II who was murdered on the spot by a bomb blast from the terrorists. The Cathedral is a sample of the ‘Russian Style’ architecture and decorative art of the edge of the XIX-XX centuries. The exterior and interior of the cathedral has over 7,000 square meters of beautiful mosaic attire that was created by the most famous Russian artists of the epoch. At the Cathedral we purchased a book that details the Cathedral beauty in detail. We later purchased a beautiful photograph of the Cathedral.

From the Cathedral we drove to the massive Hermitage Arts Museum were we toured for approximately three hours. The museum was contained within the gala halls and rooms of the former Winter Palace. The highlight of the museum visit was the Gold Room which housed hundreds of solid gold objects with many covered in beautiful gems. Some gold items had several hundred beautiful gems set into the golden object. We than saw halls lined with statures of the Roman and of the Russian era. There was room after room of fine world class art collections by west European Masters’ such as Rembrandt, Rubens, Leonardo da Vinci, Raphael, El Greco, Murillo, Van Dyck, Monet and other famous French impressionists and art of the XX century. Following this tour of the museum we walked over a mile to our minivan tour vehicle because of the massive crowd of people who had attended and participated in the St. Petersburg 303 birthday parade which ended near the museum. After a hectic drive back to the harbor we barely made it back to Russian Customs on the pier and barely boarded the Constellation minutes before it sailed from the port.

[MacThespian]

I will be on the Constellation this summer and have been researching the three major tour guides in Russia. The only difference that I notice is Alla goes to Catherine's Palace and DenRus goes to Peterhof Palace? Does anyone have feedback on which Palace is the "must see". Thanks everyone!

 

We'll be going with Denrus in August, and going to both Catherine's Palace and Peterhof. It's a custom tour, but we got together with two other families (9 folk altogether) and it's under $300 per person for the two days (I think it's closer to $265 pp, but I don't have the exact figures with me). You might want to see if you can get together with some folk on your roll call to make a custom tour worthwhile.

[china addict]

Just got back from St. Petersburg, great 2-day tour with Alla. Drive to Catherine's Palace takes over an hour, had lunch in a nice Russian restaurant then made short drive to Peterhof gardens. Absolutely splendid with stunning fountains and some fun ones that were popular with the kids. At Peterhof, also went into one of the smaller palaces. This was a full exhausting day, with just a little bit of souvenir shopping squeezed in before reboarding the ship. We thought it was an excellent combination of beautiful interiors (think Amber Room at Catherine's Palace) and fresh air and exercise at Peterhof. IMO, if you include the Hermitage and Russian Museum on second day, there's no pressing need to go inside the Peterhof Palace. Strong recommendation, take bottled water with you and have a headscarf if you want to go inside any of the beautiful churches and cathedrals.

[china addict]

Just got back from St. Petersburg, great 2-day tour with Alla. Drive to Catherine's Palace takes over an hour, had lunch in typical Russian restaurant then made short drive to Peterhof gardens. Absolutely splendid with stunning fountains and some playful ones that were popular with the kids. At Peterhof, also went into one of the smaller palaces. This was a full exhausting day, with just a little bit of souvenir shopping squeezed in before reboarding the ship. We thought it was an excellent combination of beautiful interiors (think Amber Room at Catherine's Palace) and fresh air and exercise at Peterhof. IMO, if you include the Hermitage and Russian Museum on second day, there's no pressing need to go inside the Peterhof Palace. Strong recommendation, take bottled water with you and have a headscarf if you want to go inside any of the beautiful churches and cathedrals.

[pj-atsea]

If I had to choose one, I think I'd choose the Peterhof.. The gardens are beautiful and the fountains are breathtaking. I have never seen fountains anything like that. Catherines Palace is good too, but completely different, as someone else already said, the rooms are something to see, very ornate with the Amber room ( although it is not the original Amber room, which was taken apart during the war and apparantly they never found the amber). Still it is great to see. We did both on a cruise tour on Princess.pj

[California Native]

We were on the Star Princess 5/22 my dh and i had a private tour for 2 with RO and did BOTH! you can see the full itinerary on my roll call under my old screen name latitude 22.

 

it was worth every single cent to be by ourselves.

 

do whatever it takes to pinch your pennies else to have a private tour.

[BarbJS]

With Alla you can do both. They customise the tour to whatever you want to do and even will change it at the last minute to accomidate requests. Have fun but remember to take time to enjoy it all . We considered the strenuous tour but decide to go a little slower and take the time to really enjoy what we were experiencing . Enjoy