The 2010 Baltic Thread--Cruise Tips and Planning

[Rogillio]

And it was expensive!

Carol

Glad to see I'm not the only one up at this hour of the morning! I woked up at 0330 this morning like I had good sense. Guess when you go to be at 7:30 pm, that's what happened. I will try to stay up later tonight to get my clock reset.

And yes, those items on the ship were very expensice. We discussed getting a lacque box but agreed it would just sit on a shelf collecting dust and we could find better use for the $150.

~Mike

 

[slg]

Mike:

A couple of questions: how many copies of your passport do you need in Russia. Is it one per every time you get off the boat? And do they need to be colour? I am doing 3 excursions and was going to make three colour copies, but if not necessary, I won't waste ink and paper.

Back to the evening canal cruise. Still mulling that one over after your less than favourable review. Is there any narration or is it just musical entertainment while you float around the main canals? I am still really interested, but if I don't see anything other than what I see on my way to the other two excursions then I don't see why I have to miss dinner for it.

By the way, how do they deal with dinner that night?

 

[wickesy]

Mike:

A couple of questions: how many copies of your passport do you need in Russia. Is it one per every time you get off the boat? And do they need to be colour? I am doing 3 excursions and was going to make three colour copies, but if not necessary, I won't waste ink and paper.

By the way, how do they deal with dinner that night?

I'm not Mike but I can answer a couple of these for you. You only need one copy of your passport per person and black and white is fine. The immigration officer gave us the copy back.

As far as dinner, here's a copy of the letter they left in our stateroom

We weren't on a Disney tour but dining tickets were given out to everybody to get them access to their restaurant at a time suitable for their evening plans.

 

[slg]

Thank you.

 

[Rogillio]

Mike:

A couple of questions: how many copies of your passport do you need in Russia. Is it one per every time you get off the boat? And do they need to be colour? I am doing 3 excursions and was going to make three colour copies, but if not necessary, I won't waste ink and paper.

Back to the evening canal cruise. Still mulling that one over after your less than favourable review. Is there any narration or is it just musical entertainment while you float around the main canals? I am still really interested, but if I don't see anything other than what I see on my way to the other two excursions then I don't see why I have to miss dinner for it.

By the way, how do they deal with dinner that night?

Like Wickesy wrote, they did not ask for copies of our passports. We had copies but they didn't ask for them. Also, we had copies of our private tour tickets as we were told we'd need copies...so we dutifully had 4 copies (one for each of us) but they just barely glaced at the copy I was holding and didn't take those copies either.

BTW, the forms you have to fill out say "no bloteches or cross-outs" or words to that effect. My wife had to go get additional copies of the forms and start over when she mis-wrote something...this happened twice!

We completely missed dinner both nights in SPR. We had day tours both days and DCL excursions both nights and just did not want to spend 1.5 hrs eating dinner. So we went to Topsider and grabbed a quick bite.

If the Russian Folkloric show is not on your agenda, you might consider that over the canal tour. That was VERY entertaining/enjoyable! It was a far better value than the canal tour.

~Mike

 

[MrsG]

I'm not Mike but I can answer a couple of these for you. You only need one copy of your passport per person and black and white is fine. The immigration officer gave us the copy back.

As far as dinner, here's a copy of the letter they left in our stateroom

We weren't on a Disney tour but dining tickets were given out to everybody to get them access to their restaurant at a time suitable for their evening plans.

Our DCL canal boat tour leaves at 7 pm and doesn't return until 9:45pm. Am I just reading the letter wrong, but how can anyone in second seating leaving for an excursion after 6pm eat at the revised times? I guess we will just ask the head server to eat at 5pm. Or perhaps Disney thought of that and will have tickets for dinner for that night already taken care of.

 

[Andrew DEREK UK]

Our canal boat tour leaves at 7:15 pm and doesn't return until 9:45pm. Am I just reading the letter wrong, but how can anyone in second seating leaving for an excursion after 6pm eat at the revised times? I guess we will just ask the head server to eat at 5pm

I am sure they can match people up, as we will go from early to late that night, and eat at 7.30pm.

 

[wickesy]

Our canal boat tour leaves at 7:15 pm and doesn't return until 9:45pm. Am I just reading the letter wrong, but how can anyone in second seating leaving for an excursion after 6pm eat at the revised times? I guess we will just ask the head server to eat at 5pm

We were second seating but there was a couple on our table who were doing an evening excursion and they were given dining tickets for the first seating by the Head Server, we were given tickets for the revised second seating time. You should get the dining tickets while you are at dinner on the evening before you arrive at St Petersburg.

You shouldn't need to ask for the new tickets but if nothing arrives just speak to the Head Server.

 

[slg]

I originally didn't have the evening canal cruise booked but over on cruise critic, folks were saying it was not to be missed. I also thought it might be fun for my 3 boys...8,11,14. Now I'm not so sure.

Would the folklore show be of interest to 3 boys? A show I can see anywhere, but I will probably never been in Russia again, so to be outside looking at it, the architecture, the city, seems a not to be missed opportunity. I guess I just wanted to be IN Russian as much as possible.

Is anyone else still planning on doing this excursion?

 

[Rogillio]

I originally didn't have the evening canal cruise booked but over on cruise critic, folks were saying it was not to be missed. I also thought it might be fun for my 3 boys...8,11,14. Now I'm not so sure.

Would the folklore show be of interest to 3 boys? A show I can see anywhere, but I will probably never been in Russia again, so to be outside looking at it, the architecture, the city, seems a not to be missed opportunity. I guess I just wanted to be IN Russian as much as possible.

Is anyone else still planning on doing this excursion?

It really depends on what you are doing/seeing during the day. I gave it 'bad reviews' becuase we had such good tours during the days that we didn't see anything new from the boat that we didn't drive right by during the day. Hard to say if your boys would enjoy the show...there were lots of 'traditional sounding' Russian songs, accordian music, and traditional Russian dances with about a dozen dancers who changed thier dress often. The 'choir' was all men (about 30 or so) all dressed in full dress military uniforms...which was kinda odd...but they were really good. I totally agree about being "in Russia" and not on the ship in the port. If we had not done the canal cruise, we'd of found something else to do.

I think it would be a shame to not hear some Russian music while in Russia.

~Mike

~Mike

 

[slg]

We are doing catherine's palace and hermitage second day and peterof and fountains first day.

I thought I read that there was russian folklore singers on the boat on the scanned navigators.

There is also a little singing on the canal cruise right?

I just don't know now.

 

[gydell]

Just got back from the June 12th Baltic so if you have any questions ask away! Silverline transportation was great, the Loddington House was wonderful in Dover, and the Baltic was COLD! If you are planning on doing the Santa house tour in Helsinki - don't! Anastasia was wonderful in St Petersburg, except we didn't get the meal we had pre-ordered so half of my group didn't eat.

 

[Andrew DEREK UK]

Just got back from the June 12th Baltic so if you have any questions ask away! Silverline transportation was great, the Loddington House was wonderful in Dover, and the Baltic was COLD! If you are planning on doing the Santa house tour in Helsinki - don't! Anastasia was wonderful in St Petersburg, except we didn't get the meal we had pre-ordered so half of my group didn't eat.

Hi

Can you tell me:-

Immigration Dover/on Dover/off, was there any, time etc, same as PC or not?

Immigration at Russia, everyone says OK, is it quick?

What time did you dock in Russia, was it early but couldn't get off?

Anastasia ; Payment, how, did you pay new $'s?

Thanks.

 

[gydell]

Hi

Can you tell me:-

Immigration Dover/on Dover/off, was there any, time etc, same as PC or not?

Immigration at Russia, everyone says OK, is it quick?

What time did you dock in Russia, was it early but couldn't get off?

Anastasia ; Payment, how, did you pay new $'s?

Thanks.

No problems in Dover - easier than PC.

We were the first ones off the ship in Russia and had no problems at all. Breezed right through!

We docked about 11:30, I think. We were off the ship at noon.

We paid with a credit card. They will not take tips on the card and prefer to have rubles not dollars.

We exchanged all our money on the ship the first day and were glad because they did run out of some of the countries by the time we got to them. The exchange rate was not bad.

 

[Andrew DEREK UK]

No problems in Dover - easier than PC.

We were the first ones off the ship in Russia and had no problems at all. Breezed right through!

We docked about 11:30, I think. We were off the ship at noon.

We paid with a credit card. They will not take tips on the card and prefer to have rubles not dollars.

We exchanged all our money on the ship the first day and were glad because they did run out of some of the countries by the time we got to them. The exchange rate was not bad.

Thank you.

Reports on the Barcelona>Dover repo was immigration was onboard and they had to report at times, so it was just in the Port itself?

 

[wickesy]

One thing that we found with Anastasia was that they didn't give a receipt for payment as standard, so if you want one make sure you ask for one.

 

[slg]

If anyone took any DCL excursions, I'd love to know your opinion on them...worth it, not worth it.

I'm glad Silverline worked out,we're using them

I'm hoping to do the Leeds debarkation, I wonder if that went last time. Anyone know?

Any tidbits and advice is greatly appreciated. I'm in panic mode right now...staring at empty suitcases and unable to make decisions.

12 days post cruise in London doesn't help my packing decisions.

Anyone go to the Parkwood Hotel?

 

[gydell]

Thank you.

Reports on the Barcelona>Dover repo was immigration was onboard and they had to report at times, so it was just in the Port itself?

Just showed our passports when we checked in at Dover and when we left the ship in Dover. We did have to have our passport to get back on the ship in one of the ports but I don't remember which one, DCL gave us notes on our beds every night reminding us of things we needed to do.

Also in Russia we had to keep our passports with us and give Anastasia a copy of them plus a copy of the credit card that we were using to pay for the excursion.

Another thing that I found useful(a passenger told us) that if we only had a little of the currency left from the countries we visited to leave it for your stateroom host or dining servers. They can't exchange on board and DCL is trying to give them time during the 4 cruises to be able to get of the ship in some of the countries for a few hours. They can use the money for buses.

Kids clubs were not open as many hours as on previous cruises and seemed to have fewer planned activities. IMOP - We did NOT like to new rules for the floating ages in the clubs or the changes that have happened to the Lab as a result in these!

 

[Andrew DEREK UK]

Just showed our passports when we checked in at Dover and when we left the ship in Dover. We did have to have our passport to get back on the ship in one of the ports but I don't remember which one, DCL gave us notes on our beds every night reminding us of things we needed to do.

Also in Russia we had to keep our passports with us and give Anastasia a copy of them plus a copy of the credit card that we were using to pay for the excursion.

Another thing that I found useful(a passenger told us) that if we only had a little of the currency left from the countries we visited to leave it for your stateroom host or dining servers. They can't exchange on board and DCL is trying to give them time during the 4 cruises to be able to get of the ship in some of the countries for a few hours. They can use the money for buses.

Kids clubs were not open as many hours as on previous cruises and seemed to have fewer planned activities. IMOP - We did NOT like to new rules for the floating ages in the clubs or the changes that have happened to the Lab as a result in these!

Thank you most helpful, as I had expected.

 

[wickesy]

If anyone took any DCL excursions, I'd love to know your opinion on them...worth it, not worth it.

We did the Helsinki Highlights and Finnish Food-Tasting which I would say was OK. We were initially taken to the Senate Square and given half an hour to wander round the open-air market or cathedral, whichever we preferred. Then we had a guided drive around the city before stopping off at a restaurant where the chef showed us how he made Gravlax, we had the opportunity to taste salmon, reindeer salami and a couple of other dishes then 4 or 5 dishes for dessert. It was only a taste of everything so if anybody is planning on doing it don't plan on it replacing a meal.

For Warnemunde we were told we would need to take our passports with us but nobody ever checked them, however they were checked in Stockholm before getting back on the boat. We were also told that everybody HAD to at least get off the ship at Stockholm, go through the immigration procedure and get back on again. I think I'm right in saying that could have been done at any time we were in port, there was no set time.