St Petersburg Tour Adventurer of the Seas

Hi All

We are a group of four sailing to St Petersburg on the 13 June and wondered if anybody could recommend Alla tours and how the price ($250) and experience compares to her onboard offering. Thanks

We did SPB tours. Party of 16 formed on roll call. Cost us £110 each. Very good value. I know Alla is highly rated too

We are sailing on Brilliance on June 20 and our Roll Call group has 32 signed up with Alla for a 2 day tour - cost will be $300 per person for 2 days based on group size - we will have 2 separate tours of 16 each (16 is Alla's max size). $250 sounds reasonable for a smaller private tour group for 1 day.

Alla has a Roll call for June 13, but for a 2 day tour - which may miss some of the sights you wish to see if you are only there for one day instead of two.

Alla is highly rated on cruise critic and other travel review sites.

Hi & welcome to Cruise Critic.

Here's a link to the RollCall for folk on your cruise

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1612600

Introduce yourselves to your ship-mates, and register for the Meet & Mingle get-together on-board on the first or second sea-day (free drink & nibbles, & we've won the free raffle twice in succession :))

We toured St Pete's with Alla - excellent experience, though as others have noted all the local operators are highly-rated.

Difficult to compare prices with ships' excursions since the local operators offer two full days whereas ships' offerings are a mish-mash of day & half-day excursions.

If you analyse, I think you'll find the local operators' prices are a little cheaper than the equivalent in ships' tours - but the major reason for choosing an operator like Alla is the better experience. Much more personal, in max group of 16 in a minibus, no waiting around while 50 folk - some of them very slow - get on or off their coach, zip through the traffic, park closer, very flexible timetabling, pre-public admission to the Hermitage & queue-busting elsewhere, rides on the subway & a hydrofoil, no returning to the ship for lunch then joining a second half-day tour.

We're just back from a great Med cruise on Adventure otS.

Good food (both the MDR & the Windjammer buffet), decent entertainment (great guest acts, though yours will be different), good atmosphere on board.

Minor niggle is the limited seating in bars in the evenings - wide choice of bars, but if you're on second sitting or late out of the theatre your choice will be determined by where you can find a seat. And the Murder-Mystery in the Portofino was exceptionally poor - the result was more like a raffle than an exercise in sleuthing. These are hints - don't take them as major criticisms.

Do check out the drinks prices - like Independence otS, when sailing from the UK I think you'll find that the 15% service charge is already incorporated into the bar/wine prices & not added to them.

And say hello to Becky, the activities manager, from her flash-mob "star" :D

See also my notes at http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1851480

other than the RollCall link

Great itinerary, have a great time

JB :)

Welcome to Cruise Critic. Many have used and enjoyed Alla, we used SPB, they were great.