Russia River Cruise

[tskeeter]

Anybody taken one of the Moscow to St. Petersburg river cruises?

What river cruise line did you use?

Pros/cons of the cruise line you used.

What did you think of the trip over all?

What do you think were the highlights of your trip?

What should others think about when considering a trip like this, both good and not so good

[wodehouse]

I will be interested in reading all the comments. I am interested in river cruises like this but have never been on one (been on one cruise, big ship in Carribean, not really my cup of tea). I hope to go on a river cruise in the next year or so.

Here are some informative sites I have found:

www.rivercruises.com
www.bargecompany.com
www.ricksteves.com

[Deleted]

Sorry I'm so late to the party. You might try PMing Athena53. I think she did one. In fact I think her avatar is a picture of her in St. Petersburg.

[Deleted]

Hi! Just saw this! No, my recent cruise was Alaska, and my avatar is actually the Taj Mahal.

Anyway, I'd check with cruisecritic.com. We keep getting mailings from Viking River Cruises and I believe this is one of the offerings, and the reviews don't seem so great. Keep in mind that you'll never get the amenities of the floating-shopping-mall ships: your room will be smaller, there's usually only one restaurant, entertainment is conversations, watching the world go by, or reading a good book. We loved our Alaska cruise on Innersea Discoveries, though. It had all the limitations I just mentioned but great crew and a group of smart, curious fellow passengers.

DH and I went to St. Petersburg on our honeymoon- land only, skipped Moscow entirely. We never even used a travel agent. Other than rainy weather (to be expected in October) we had a great time. You can do a lot with some good Web research, and we did our trip 9 years ago when there was even less out there. Also, if you work a little to study the Russian alphabet, you'll find that many of the words that look indecipherable are actually derived from English, French or German so it's not quite that mysterious.

Highlights: touring the Youssupovsky mansion where they poisoned Rasputin, the trip to Pushkin (Tsarskoe Seloe) to see the Catherine Palace, where the Tsar and his family were held after the revolution, and the French Impressionists at the Hermitage. We used private guides for all 3- a splurge but well worth it for us because we're Russian history buffs and wanted to ask lots of questions.

[tskeeter]

Thanks for the feedback, Athena!

We're in hire a guide mode, too. We did that back in May, when we went to Normandy. The guide we used absolutely made that part of the trip for us. Our personal history teacher, story teller, reference librarian, military strategy and tactics expert, and chauffeur, all in one.

Without a guide, we'd have seen some sandy beaches, some beach front museums, a few gun emplacements, and the American Cemetery.

With a guide, we were able to see hedgerow that existed as it did in 1944, hear the retelling of the personal experiences of D-day veterans, learn the impact of inclement weather on the invasion, discuss the German defensive strategy, explore the command bunker overlooking Sword Beach, visit a church that had been used as a medical aid station and hear the story of the medics who assisted Allied, German, and local French casualties, and learn how both German and Allied decisions during the course of the invasion affected the outcome. The decision to invest in a guide was the best decision of the trip.

So how did you find guides? Did you use a guide service that assigns you one of their staff? Or did you hire guides on you own?

[Deleted]

Aug 20, 2012 15:31:34 GMT -5 tskeeter said:

So how did you find guides? Did you use a guide service that assigns you one of their staff? Or did you hire guides on you own?

The trip to the Youssupovksy palace was arranged through our hotel (Radisson). We'd heard that sometimes they don't let random visitors in and wanted to be sure we weren't turned away.

I think I got the name of our guide from the crowd on flyertalk.com. They have separate Boards for different areas and a Search is likely to turn up more current names than the one we used in 2003. This particular woman took us through the Hermitage and delegated the Catherine Palace tour to an associate whom we also liked very much- a slightly quirky phililogy professor who took us to Pushkin via the Metro (all signs in Cyrillic!) then transferring to a van full of locals where you find a seat, pass your money up to the driver at the front, and then your change is passed back through the same sets of hands. Apparently this is a local transit system run by Georgians- not something we would have tried on our own and a fun piece of local color!

I agree that a private guide is a wonderful luxury- the tour gets tailored to exactly what interests you.

[tskeeter]

I agree that a private guide is a wonderful luxury- the tour gets tailored to exactly what interests you.

Athena, I agree that a guide is a luxury. But I've come to wonder if they don't add enough to the experience to justify the cost. Maybe rather than viewing the guide service as an expense, it should be viewed as an investment in maximizing your travel experience. You learn so much more, you may get exposed to things you would have missed (like a jitney ride), you may get preferred access to sights (and waste less time standing in lines), and they eliminate the anxiety of trying to find your way around in unfamiliar locations. All things that increase your enjoyment and the return on your travel dollars.

[Deleted]

Aug 22, 2012 12:26:37 GMT -5 tskeeter said:

Athena, I agree that a guide is a luxury. But I've come to wonder if they don't add enough to the experience to justify the cost. Maybe rather than viewing the guide service as an expense, it should be viewed as an investment in maximizing your travel experience. <snip>

No argument here! ;D

[The Walk of the Penguin Mich]

TD and I used a private tour guide when we went through Cappadocia, in Turkey. I think that the 3 days we spent there was $500 per person. This covered our hotel, all meals, all entrances into attractions, all travel in the area, the hot air balloon ride at sunrise and transport to and from the airport.

It was expensive, but we saw and learned far more about the area than we would have on our own. The only thing we didn't do was stay in a cave hotel. That added another $300 pp to the cost.