Shore Excursions for 10-day Northern Europe?

[jakeman]

Hey everyone,

I am trying to get a general idea for budget purposes the types and cost of shore excursion for the above cruise.

Does anyone have a resources that is somewhat accurate? I found www.cruisecompete.com and it seems pretty good, but I wasn't sure about the validity of it.

I'm not looking for anything too specific, just don't want sticker shock when it's time to book three months out!

Thanks!

@sls19

 

[Bolna]

Hey everyone,

I am trying to get a general idea for budget purposes the types and cost of shore excursion for the above cruise.

Does anyone have a resources that is somewhat accurate? I found www.cruisecompete.com and it seems pretty good, but I wasn't sure about the validity of it.

I'm not looking for anything too specific, just don't want sticker shock when it's time to book three months out!

Thanks!

@sls19

I am going to be on the 7-night Norway cruise and have been checking out the excursions other cruise lines (Princess, RCL, HAL) offer for the ports that I am going to go to. It seems that most cruise lines will offer more or less the same.

However, we are mainly planning to do our own thing in our ports as they are all towns that are very accessible by foot or public transport. I think that also holds true for at least some of the ports you are going to go to. I have been to Helsinki and Stockholm and they are easy to get around. Especially Helsinki is very walkable from where the cruise ships dock. Stockholm is far more spread out, but has an excellent public transport system.

Also, check out www.cruisecritic.com for ideas on what to do in different ports. They do have a rather active community and I noticed that for a lot of the European ports there seem to be locals posting there giving tips about how to be a cruise ship tourist in their town.

 

[dadddio]

When we did the Northern European cruise, we mostly didn't use Disney's excursions. We either did hop on/off tours or went in on a private tour. It was pretty easy to google up the hop on/off tours to make sure that we would like them and to get prices.

 

[ChuckElias]

I did lots of tours in 2010 on the Northern Capitals cruise, but I honestly don't remember the pricing. Sorry!

 

[DISNEY FANTASY]

Hey everyone,

I am trying to get a general idea for budget purposes the types and cost of shore excursion for the above cruise.

Does anyone have a resources that is somewhat accurate? I found www.cruisecompete.com and it seems pretty good, but I wasn't sure about the validity of it.

I'm not looking for anything too specific, just don't want sticker shock when it's time to book three months out!

Thanks!

@sls19

The DCL ones will come out December or January they will be expensive, I went on the 2010 Baltic run and I am on the 7/22 one next year.

If you search cruise critic there was a video report from the cruise in 2010.

Now I know they are planning some very special port adventures, such as with the hermitage in St Petersburg, last time they had a character ball at Catherine's place but expect one dollar change out of $400.pp.

The issues in St Petes is you couldn't do it all with DCL, there is do much to see, and their tour times clashed, ie if on a daytime one you couldn't do an evening ballet one.

Now at St Petes you have to either go on a DCL Tour or use a local Russian TA otherwise you can't get off, you can't just go DIY there under the cruise visa rules.

I in 2010 and many others booked with Anasastia travel, I had a two day optimum sightseeing package cheaper than DCL for a family and did far more than they can do, I will be out till 9 pm this time on the first night.

For other ports, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Tallinn, are very near the port you could go HOHO bus or walk or get a taxi, Helsinki is a bit further, DCL might lay on a transfer bus to the town.

I have reviewed costs now Copenhagen and Stockholm, are very expensive cities, I would say either book DCL or go DIY on public transport do not book third party shore trips, for St Petes to get the best out of your visit book Anastasia or another local TA and you will see far more, have a personal trip and save money.

 

[jakeman]

I did lots of tours in 2010 on the Northern Capitals cruise, but I honestly don't remember the pricing. Sorry!

No problem! Did you have any tour companies you would recommend?

The DCL ones will come out December or January they will be expensive, I went on the 2010 Baltic run and I am on the 7/22 one next year.

If you search cruise critic there was a video report from the cruise in 2010.

Now I know they are planning some very special port adventures, such as with the hermitage in St Petersburg, last time they had a character ball at Catherine's place but expect one dollar change out of $400.pp.

The issues in St Petes is you couldn't do it all with DCL, there is do much to see, and their tour times clashed, ie if on a daytime one you couldn't do an evening ballet one.

Now at St Petes you have to either go on a DCL Tour or use a local Russian TA otherwise you can't get off, you can't just go DIY there under the cruise visa rules.

I in 2010 and many others booked with Anasastia travel, I had a two day optimum sightseeing package cheaper than DCL for a family and did far more than they can do, I will be out till 9 pm this time on the first night.

For other ports, Copenhagen, Stockholm, Tallinn, are very near the port you could go HOHO bus or walk or get a taxi, Helsinki is a bit further, DCL might lay on a transfer bus to the town.

I have reviewed costs now Copenhagen and Stockholm, are very expensive cities, I would say either book DCL or go DIY on public transport do not book third party shore trips, for St Petes to get the best out of your visit book Anastasia or another local TA and you will see far more, have a personal trip and save money.

That's great info about St. Pete. I wasn't aware of that.

I checked out the Anasastia travel. It looks like the price goes down the more people are on the tour right?

 

[DISNEY FANTASY]

No problem! Did you have any tour companies you would recommend?

That's great info about St. Pete. I wasn't aware of that.

I checked out the Anasastia travel. It looks like the price goes down the more people are on the tour right?

Yes many people on our FB group have shared and reduced costs you see a lot more And it's cheaper then DCL

 

[Ralphlaw]

We're splurging and doing the Adventure By Disney from the ship. We did a pre Adventure in June in Barcelona and loved it. We did not do the shipboard Adventure while on the MED cruise because we really wanted to do certain things, like Pompeii, which were not a part of the Adventure.

I don't have anything in particular I really want to do in the Baltic cities, so we're going to go with the Adventure. No it ain't cheap, but with two kids, it seemed to make sense.

 

[DISNEY FANTASY]

We're splurging and doing the Adventure By Disney from the ship. We did a pre Adventure in June in Barcelona and loved it. We did not do the shipboard Adventure while on the MED cruise because we really wanted to do certain things, like Pompeii, which were not a part of the Adventure.

I don't have anything in particular I really want to do in the Baltic cities, so we're going to go with the Adventure. No it ain't cheap, but with two kids, it seemed to make sense.

It's a great cruise.

 

[ChuckElias]

No problem! Did you have any tour companies you would recommend?

That trip was before I started my travel business, so we didn't know any better and just all of our excursions through DCL. So, unfortunately, I can't give you any help with outside vendors there.

 

[jakeman]

Hey everyone.

If anyone here is going on this cruise, shore excursions are up for preview for everywhere except Copenhagen.

Link here.

@sls19