Baltic Shore Excursions, Berlin and St.Petersburg

[johnami]

We are going on a Baltic cruise in June and wonder if anyone has a suggestion of a great shore excursion for Berlin and St. Petersburg. We understand that we don't need a visa for Russia if we take NCL's excursion, but have heard that there are other tours, who will also handle the visa problem.

[goldmom]

We did the Baltics and it was probably one of our best trips. You will have a great time! Check out the port of call boards, there is a ton of info there on tours and tour operators. I spent many hours there researching information. You may also want to pick up a good tour book so you can decide what you want to see.

 

Just be aware that to get to Berlin it is about a 2-3 hour train ride each way. In St Petersburg, the Hermitage is a must do and you should also try to get to at least one of the palaces, they are incredible. The Cathedral of Spilled Blood was also a must see for us. Once you decide what it is you want to see, then you can decide on your tours.

 

I know there are a lot of independent and reliable tour operators in Russia, but we ended up using the ship's tours and found them very informative and had no problems with long lines or large crowds.

 

I probably spent more time researching this trip than any other we've been on. Good luck and enjoy!

[taxmantoo]

We were in the Baltics last summer on an NCL cruise and totally agree with the previous poster that research will make your trip much more enjoyable. The Europe ports of call board is a great source of info.

 

We spent a great day visiting Berlin on a Denrus tour. Bus to Berlin, sightseeing in Berlin with a guide, lunch included, etc... Left at 8 am and we came back to the ship around 9:30 pm. A long and exhausting day but we would repeat anytime. Denrus was very easy to deal with and offered a great value compared to ship tours.

 

In St. Petersburg, I arranged a 2-day private tour for 8 people (Cruise Critics mates met on the Roll Call for our cruise) with Anastasia Travel. Once again, Anastasia was easy to deal with, always quick to reply to our numerous questions and very cooperative. She gladly customized the tour to meet our needs and provided a quality service. We saw much more than the ship's shore excursions, paid less and never waited in line anywhere, which you will quickly discover is the norm with ship's tours. We always went to the front of the line.

 

So do your research and then enjoy the cruise. It is a wonderful itinerary.

[WhenIsOurNextCruise]

In St. Petersburg, my husband and I did a 2 day private tour with a driver and guide and thought it was worth every penny. I would definitely make the trip to Peterhof Palace - the grounds are unbelievable. And our guide told us in order to see every exhibit at the Hermitage would take 8 months! They have amazing works of art by just about every artist known to man. The one thing I wish I had done before hand was make a family tree of all the royalty so I could keep up with who was overthrowing, murdering or marrying whom. It's a fascinating country with a lot of pride and some amazing palaces and cathedrals.

[sjbdtz]

http://www.saint-petersburg-hotels-accommodation.com/doc-MzYw-St.Petersburg-guide.html

 

 

Read through these pages.

 

Things NOT to miss:

 

Catherine Palace (Tsarskoye Selo)

Pederhof

Church of the Resurrection on Spilled Blood

Hermitage / Winter palace

The Peter & Paul fortress was impressive too. It's where most of the Tsars are enterred.

 

 

i have tonnes of pics on my webshots (see my signature for the link)....

[Bennett'sCruise]

We booked a private tour in St. Petersburg thru Alla. Had a van driver and a guide for 2 days. We told them what we wanted to see and they figured out the best way to see everything. They will take you to the front of the line at each place and the guide stays with you. Excellent.

We did not opt to go to Berlin. Just too long of a day for us. Instead we took the tour out to Scherwin. That was a fabulous tour that we highly recomend!

I would advise you to go to the Ports of Call section on the Cruise Critic boards and look at St. Petersburg and Berlin.

There is a LOT of pre-planning to do for a Baltics cruise. Just dig in and learn all you can before making decisions for each port.

One thing I did to prepare myself for St. Petersburg was to get and view two DVDs: Nicholas and Alexandra and Catherine the Great. Excellent movies that will give you a good background of the things you will be seeing in Russia.

Have a great cruise!

Dianne

[HawaiiCruisers]

We have booked a tour for June 2009 with SPB-Tours owned by Viktoria Rother. She is highly recommended throughout the various boards concerning both St. Petersburg and Berlin (SPB). Every aspect of Viktoria to date has been fantastic. She responds to emails promptly much more so than any other tour agency I contacted. Look at her website http://www.spb-tours.com/ for details.

 

Viktoria's emails have been complete and clear. She answers every question including the difficult ones. I could not recommend her any more highly.

[friendship]

We used Victoria and she was wonderful. I would highly reconmend her. A private tour with a few people is much better than a bus load. Victoria gets the visa info, is always waiting on you by the ship, her knowledge is remarkable. She will help with getting others to join your group.

[friendship]

I also meant to add that we had Viktoria's husband meet us at the ship in Germany , drove us to Berlin where we met a guide, saw as much as possible and ate at a wonderful German restaurant. i highly recommend Viktoria's company SPB-tours

[StLouisCruisingGuys]

We were in St. Petersburg last spring on The Azamara Journey. We booked privately with Red October and they were fantastic. I worried about it being far more than just using the boat tours, but found that, when we compared with others on board, we paid only about $200 more for 2.5 days of amazing service, private for the two of us, with an Interpreter/Guide and car and driver than couples who booked 5 excursions over the 2.5 days with the boat. And we were always swept right to the front of every line. We could to modify our itinerary on a whim. Both our Guide and driver were good in English and wonderful companions for the trip. I give Red October at least a 9 on a scale of 10.

[Jayhawk14]

We spent three days in St. Petersburg in the wonderful company of Viktoria the owner of SPB tours. It was the highlight of our 3 week cruise to Scandinavia and the Baltic. Her information was accurate and responses to questions almost immediate. The cost compared to ship tours turned out to be a bargain for what we saw and did. Her English is fluent, she's a wealth of information, a dynamo, and beautiful on top of all that. She allowed us to experience and be a part of Russia - not just an observer from a bus - subway rides, lunch in a small cafe. Highly recommended. You'll have a ball

[ProudMom2006]

I had both my St. Petersburg and Berlin tours with SPB Tours last June.

The price of the private tours provided by a few companies, SPB, Red October, Alla ... are about the same. I chose SPB because they always reponsed quicky, with all the questions answered in details.

 

Viktoria was our tour guide at St. Petersburg. She is a wonderful lady. She's an experienced tour guide. She did an excellent job showing us around the city. Then we met Viktoria's husband at Berlin. He did a good job to let us see the most out of Berlin within the limited of time we had.

 

It's a lot cheaper to join a private tour yourself instead of going with the ship's onshore excursion. And I highly recommend SPB Tours.

[lhall85917]

I'll add to the others suggestions of going with a private tour company, we did this last year in St Petersburg and felt that it was much better than we ever could have done with a ship's excursion. One thing I wish we had included in our tour last year was a canal cruise, I'd recommend checking on the possibility of doing that.

[nolaAlive]

Another vote for Alla: http://www.alla-tour.com/

 

Some pictures:

 

Jul08_StP_1 Jul08_StP_2 Jul08_StP_3

 

Jul08_StP_4 Jul08_StP_5 Jul08_StP_6

 

 

Russian Shopping

[Ms belp]

I'll add to the others suggestions of going with a private tour company, we did this last year in St Petersburg and felt that it was much better than we ever could have done with a ship's excursion. One thing I wish we had included in our tour last year was a canal cruise, I'd recommend checking on the possibility of doing that.

 

Sorry to disagee, but I've done several canal cruises as excursions and they were always disappointing. The only one that came close was in Paris.

[lhall85917]

Sorry to disagee, but I've done several canal cruises as excursions and they were always disappointing. The only one that came close was in Paris.

 

Hey, thats why we're here - we all have different opinions to share! I can't say if the St Petersburg one would be good, but I would have liked to have tried it. We did the canal cruise on our own in Copenhagen and loved it! Did the waterways cruise in Stockholm and didn't care for it. From what we've seen on travel shows the canal cruise in St Petersburg might have given a different perspective than what we saw. I would have given up the Hermitage to do this. We also only had about 15 minutes at Church of the Spilled Blood - way too short of a time!!

We would love to do the one in Paris sometime too. Last year we went there for one day on the Eurostar and didn't have time to do it. Just not enough time to do it all!!

[Kas55]

We are going on a Baltic cruise with Celebrity at the end of August 09.

 

We have met up with a wonderful couple through this site, who have organised a tour with Viktoria for nine of us. It all sounds wonderful, but Catherine's Palace will be closed when we are there and only open to the large companies and not hers. I believe the cruise excursion get in with no problems.

 

So, now we have a dilemma - do we miss out on Catherine's palace and Pushkin ( not included in the tour now), or do we go with the ship's tour. Price - wise, there is not that much difference, if you consider that lunch is included with the ship tour, which it is not with Viktoria.

 

As we are both in our fifties, and will probably never re- visit Russia, we want to get the most out of St Petersburg and see all the 'musts", we now find ourselves in a dilemma - to go with the ship tour or with Viktoria in a small group.

 

Also, my travel agent ( a native of St . Petersburg), is concerned about us giving our passport numbers out to a relatively small company. She says there is a lot of fraud in Russia and you have to be extremely careful, which is why she recommends the ship tours. Also, she states, if your ship is delayed for whatever reason and comes into port late, you will get an excursion refund. What happens with the smaller private companies should this unlikely, but not improbable event occur??

 

I would appreciate all input and advice here before we make a final decision on what to do here.

 

Many thanks.