Norwegian Sun 15/7/12 Baltics Review - Pictures and Food and Dailies!

[TAGVAN]

Thank you for all the details! I am also taking LOTS of notes. We leave in 4 days!!

[jku2]

Thanks so much for writing this detailed experience on the Sun.

We will be on it in 2 weeks , so any information you can give on the dailys and shows would help us greatly!!

[blusun]

Are you going to be on it October 14th-24th?

 

Donna

 

 

We are - and it can't get here fast enough!

[wabbit42]

Thanks so much for writing this detailed experience on the Sun.

We will be on it in 2 weeks , so any information you can give on the dailys and shows would help us greatly!!

 

I think I will put all the dailies in at the end, if you can wait that long ;)

[wabbit42]

Tuesday 17th July - Day at Sea

 

 

I was awake at 8am to find it was raining :(. I needed something to cheer me up so I went to Moderno to see if they had any breakfast pizzas - but they didn't! Luckily Moderno had its own buffet and it wasn't too busy, I even got myself a window seat to enjoy breakfast at.

 

After breakfast the sun came out and it stayed like that all day.

 

 

 

At about 11am we were sat in the Great Outdoors and I was feeling hungry, and I stumbled across the self-serve ice cream station. You can choose from vanilla, vanilla with chocolate and chocolate. They also have sprinkles on the side if you so please. Unfortunately the self serve ice cream is not available for long each day, but you can always get some from the Garden cafe (which isn't self serve). Also, on some warm days the ice cream came out very melted which was a shame.

 

 

In the freestyle daily I had seen that Ginza Sushi was open for lunch. Dad isn't a fan of fish so he didn't have anything :rolleyes:, but I chose Sake (salmon sushi) and the californian roll (crabstick, avocado and cucumber urimaki). I was surprised by how much you get and it was quite a reasonable price - $6.25. The sushi I get from the supermarket at home costs more and is much lower quality.

 

 

That was a good meal, I can definitely recommend it, and I wasn't hungry afterwards which is definitely a plus.

[wabbit42]

Tuesday 17th July - Day at Sea (Part 2)

 

 

After that lunch I walked up towards the observation deck. The pool area was completely packed with sunbathers. I should mention that the weather throughout the cruise was great except for the first day in St Petersburg. Temperatures were normally up at about 20ºc, which we were surprised by considering how far north we were and that the Baltic Sea freezes every winter! And coming from the UK, 20º is hot, believe me ;).

 

The observation lounge balcony is a... fun... place to be on a sea day. The winds are incredible but it is nice to cool down a bit. And nobody else dares to go there so you can have it as a private balcony :D .

 

 

After that I did a couple of circuits of the Deck 6 track.

 

 

 

There is another track on Deck 12 aft but from memory you need to do 12 1/2 laps for a mile because it's so small! Also the winds there are the strongest on the ship, not too fun to walk through and there are some exhaust vents.

 

At about 7:30pm we headed to Seven Seas for dinner. I had broccoli and cheese soup, followed by mushroom ravioli and cheesecake again. Dad had greek salad, leg of lamb and lemon sorbet.

 

The soup I had was very good as was the ravioli, unfortunately the ravioli only had four pieces on the plate, not much for a main course! Dad's greek salad wasn't anything special but the lamb was perfectly cooked according to him. The two desserts were as before.

 

(I forgot to photograph my starter, sorry.)

 

After dinner we waited for the 9:30pm showing of 'Duo Balskatt'. It is a show comprising of two ex-cirque performers and was probably the best show of the cruise. I won't give too much away for those sailing soon. After the show we admired the sunset from our balcony at about 10:30pm that night. The days were long in the Baltics, from about 4am to 11pm.

[BlueLadyBlue]

Loving reading your review, thanks so much and keep it coming!

[Sauer-kraut]

You could have ordered more Ravioli without any problem, or did you find that the four were enough?

[wabbit42]

You could have ordered more Ravioli without any problem, or did you find that the four were enough?

 

I knew I could have ordered more and no it wan't enough, but I had my sights set on the GO cake buffet so I wasn't too bothered ;)

[wabbit42]

Wednesday 18th July - Tallinn, Estonia

 

We woke up just in time to see the final part of the docking at 8am. We were joined in the port by two other ships: MSC Magnifica and Costa Fortuna (which had been docked next to us in Copenhagen).

 

 

We were off the ship at 9am and followed the crowds into the old town. And when I say 'we followed the crowds', there was literally a line of thousands of cruise passengers walking the same way into town. When you see 'Fat Margaret' you have arrived at the gate into the old town. We walked along the main street, Pikk, up to the market square. Here we visited the tourist information centre which had free wifi and picked up a map. We were visiting the KGB museum at 11am and we still had an hour to spend. So we visited the most recognisable landmark in the city - Alexander Nevsky Cathedral.

 

Fat Margaret

 

Pikk in Old Town

 

Alexander Nevsky Cathedral

 

A short walk down Viru and we arrived at the Viru hotel, where the KGB museum is located. The hotel also has free wifi ;).

[wabbit42]

Wednesday 18th July - Tallinn, Estonia

 

I'll give you a little bit of a backstory to the KGB museum.

 

In the 70s, Estonia was part of the Soviet Union. The Soviets wanted to encourage more tourists to visit, whilst at the same time keep a close eye on them and make them think their country was great. To this ed they built this new, modern hotel in 1975. At the time it was the only skyscraper in the country. After construction was finished there were two weeks where 'nothing' happened, which was when the KGB installed microphones throughout the hotel. The elevator only went up to the 22nd floor and the 23rd floor was for 'maintenance'... I think you can guess what was up there. Anyway, in 1991, the KGB left the hotel overnight, leaving behind some of their equipment.

 

The tour was over booked, and there were something like 50 people in the group. The top floor offered great views of the city and port.

 

 

 

 

The museum was only really comprised of two rooms, but the guide was very good and the room had been left in the exact state it was found in 1991. I would definitely recommend the museum for anyone spending the day in Tallinn. The hotel only takes about 10 minutes to get to from the old town's market square.

 

 

The room.

 

Afterwards we had lunch at a nice American restaurant... and then walked up to Toompea where we had another excellent view of the city from here.

 

From here we stopped off at the supermarket for more cabin supplies and were back on the ship for 4pm. The ship promptly left at 5:20pm that evening. The MSC had left an hour before, and Costa left about 10 minutes after us.

 

This evening we opted for dinner at Four Seasons. Here was where we found some Americans, unlike Seven Seas where we mostly heard other languages. We both had onion soup for starter, it was very good and Dad thought it was one of the best he'd had. I had spaghetti bolognese for main which was good and came in a very large portion - that made up for my last pasta dish! Dad had pork medallions which were well cooked but a small portion. For dessert I had cinnamon apple pie, which was good but would have been better warm, and Dad had lemon sorbet... again.

 

 

 

When we got back to our room we found this guy:

 

[wabbit42]

Wednesday 18th July - Tallinn, Estonia (Evening)

 

After dinner we went to watch Deal or No Deal.

 

 

 

We weren't expecting much but it was well presented by cruise director Richard and by the end we were wishing we'd bought a playing card! It lasted 45 minutes (from 8:45pm) and two games were played. The money you win goes as onboard credit, predictably :rolleyes:.

 

After that we were treated to a spectacular sunset. And we had a friend join us for it:

 

 

 

 

It was amazing to see the Costa sailing past us like that, with that backdrop too.

 

 

 

 

One last thing: I forgot to add the picture of the towel animal from the sea day! Here it is:

 

[Jessicalou]

Just amazing, and thank you for the updates!

 

We've booked!! 11th August 2012 :D

[wabbit42]

Just amazing, and thank you for the updates!

 

We've booked!! 11th August 2012 :D

 

Enjoy it!

[Doughboy139]

Thanks for posting these pictures. My Mom and I did this Baltic cruise on the Sun in 2010 and loved it so much the we also did it in 2011 as part of a B2B with the T/A. These pictures bring back great memories. I will have to do it again in a few years. My favorite port was Tallinn and Stockholm.

[wabbit42]

Thursday 19th July - St Petersburg Day 1

 

 

The morning's weather was not favourable, and we had got up early in anticipation of a tour starting at 8:30am. However, after breakfast we were still undocked in the middle of the port. By about 8am the captain came on the comm and said he had ordered a tug to help us dock because it was too risky to do it ourselves because of the wind.

 

 

By 9:30am we were docked. Russian customs took about 30 minutes and by 10:30am we were through. We had booked a two day tour with SPB tours at about $550 combined for the two of us. We were greeted outside the terminal by Viktoria, the manager and were told where the minivan was. We were about the fourth pair onto the bus. We took the back row of four seats, since there were 18 seats but the tours only fill up to 16. Luckily nobody argued about it and we kept the extra room. We were introduced to our guide Elena and our driver Dimitri and then we were off. Our first stop was a viewpoint on the River Neva to grab some photos of Peter and Paul's Cathedral, which was our first tour.

 

 

Unfortunately we were 2 and a half hours behind schedule because of the weather so we had a quick tour through the cathedral.

 

 

Having learnt about the russian revolutions in history it was amazing to actually visit places and see things I had learnt about little over a year ago. Here we saw the tomb of Nicholas II, the last Tsar, among others.

 

From here we stopped at a gift shop for a 'comfort break'. Even the free tea and coffee didn't stop it from being a tourist trap. The place was packed, with other tour companies like NCL and MSC also being present. We were supposed to take a hydrofoil ride to Peterhof next but the hydrofoils were cancelled because of the weather, so we took the minibus there which cut into our schedule again. It was worth it to see the famous fountains and gardens though. Like many of the things we saw, you can't understand the scale and majesty of these places without seeing them in person. but hopefully my pictures help!

 

 

[wabbit42]

Thursday 19th July - St Petersburg Day 1 (Part 2)

 

We only spent about 30 minutes in Peterhof, even though we could have easily spent longer. But SPB aren't to blame, I would actually commend them because we still managed to see everything in the program despite the delay.

 

We drove a few minutes up the road to stop for lunch. We turned into a driveway leading up to what Elena said was an old palace turned into a restaurant. But we weren't going there, instead we turned around and went across the road to what appeared to be some kind of theme park or campground, I couldn't really work it out. We entered a large tent in the middle of a field and had our lunch there. It was a terrible meal and we weren't surprised when we saw them carrying a microwave into the kitchen!

 

The main course...

 

 

After that we drove to the Tsar's village. We visited Catherine's Palace.

 

 

This was probably one of the most spectacular places we visited, because of its size and the decorations inside.

 

 

 

The large room above is coated with 7 tonnes of gold leaf. Most people let out a gasp when we entered that room because it was incredible. Most of the rooms in the palace were adorned like that.

 

Afterwards we drove back into St Petersburg. We had a subway ride to do. The escalators down were long - I timed it and it took two whole minutes to reach the bottom! The stations themselves were also well decorated.

 

 

 

We took the train two stops up the track. After that ride we took the minibus back to the ship and were back for 7pm. We had a meal in the Garden Cafe where I used a steak as a burger patty because they had run out of burgers. That was about as exciting as it got, and we remembered why we never ate in the buffet for dinner.

[jku2]

Just amazing, and thank you for the updates!

 

We've booked!! 11th August 2012 :D

 

jessica - there are a group of us on the on the ncl sun roll call

please join us there

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/showthread.php?t=1452316

[joeholiday2]

Hi Wabbit.

 

Thanks again for the wonderful report, some great info in there. Will look forward to the rest of it when we return.

 

As time will be tight tomorrow we will get a taxi to the port, but use your instructions to get back to the airport when we return.

 

Joe.

[wabbit42]

Hi Wabbit.

 

Thanks again for the wonderful report, some great info in there. Will look forward to the rest of it when we return.

 

As time will be tight tomorrow we will get a taxi to the port, but use your instructions to get back to the airport when we return.

 

Joe.

 

When it came time to disembark we went down to Deck 3 15 minutes early and they actually let us off 10 minutes early, at 6:50am. Also, there were only about 10 other people there, which made it even easier. Enjoy your cruise :) .

[wabbit42]

Friday 20th July - St Petersburg Day 2

 

 

We were up early again this morning for the second day of our tour. The weather was back to sunny and warm so we had breakfast in the Great Outdoors again. We were through customs to meet the bus at 7:45am.

 

Our fist stop today was for a canal boat ride. The tour lasted about an hour and was conducted by another SPB tour guide. We found it quite dull but it was good to see other parts of the city that we would be exploring later in the day.

 

 

The Hermitage from the River Neva

 

 

After that we went to the Hermitage. It is a very big museum and we spent about 2 hours inside. The first few parts were showing off more spectacular rooms and bits off Russian history. After that the last 1 1/2 hours of the tour were about all the paintings and sculptures inside, which I didn't mind but got a bit drawn out towards the end.

 

 

 

They had lots of these large marble bowls. They actually built up the walls around this one after it was in the room, because it was so big.

 

 

We got a bit of free time so I went and looked around outside in the square.

 

 

 

Our next stop was at a pie restaurant for our lunch. We were allowed two slices of pie and a drink, so I had beef pie and apple pie. They were actually quite good.

 

Anyway, the tour continued with a stop at the Church on Spilled Blood. The inside of the church was even more spectacular than the outside!

 

 

 

 

It was a short stop but it was only one room really. We got another bit of free time so I took many, many pictures of the church.

 

Next was Yusupov's palace. It was $6 to buy a photo pass here so I didn't buy one and haven't got any photos. But it is mostly the same as the other palaces, except each room was designed to resemble different countries, for example India, England, France etc. We also saw the spot where Rasputin was killed, although that section of the tour seemed more like a theme park attraction than a museum.

[Jessicalou]

Please tell me your lunch was a little more appetising on day 2 wabbit?? :)

[wabbit42]

Friday 20th July - St Petersburg Day 2 (Part 2)

 

 

After Yusupov's palace we had one more stop to make - St Isaac's Cathedral.

 

 

The Cathedral was impressive on the inside, with mosaics instead of paintings like the Church on Spilled Blood.

 

We drove back to the ship and were onboard by 5pm, after taking a group photo!

 

 

 

I walked along Deck 11 to grab a burger from the BBQ, ad this is the sight I saw:

 

 

The poolside was packed with people watching the Russian Folklore show - this was the busiest I had seen it all cruise. In our room we had another friend!

 

 

And I forgot last night's again, so here it is:

 

[ddakrt]

Excellent review Wabbit! Thanks for taking the time to do this.

 

I'd love to do this itinerary in the future so you most definitely had gotten my attention lol, and please feel free to post more of your pictures if you can. Very cool!

 

BTW, what did you think of the Sun after being on the Gem?

[wabbit42]

BTW, what did you think of the Sun after being on the Gem?

 

Aaah, that's for the last part!