MSC Musica Northern Europe July 2013 Helpful tips

[travellers from Oz]

My husband and I will be doing a back to back cruise up the Norway coast and into the Baltic Sea (Stockholm etc) in July/August 2013 with MSC Musica. Has anyone been at that time of year and what is the weather like and what type of clothing would be required. We come from the Gold Coast Australia where even in winter we only go as low as 8 degrees centigrade and a high of approx 24. We wonder if our winter clothing would be ok for Norway summer. Is it warm or cold when you get off the ship for onshore tours. Also any info for onshore tours. We don't mind doing our own thing but if there is a really worthwhile tour we would be happy to do it. Any useful piece of information re any part of the cruise would be appreciated. Thanks.:)

[ToothDoc2010]

We also are traveling on the Musica in July 2013. We leave from Kiel, Germany and have stops at Copenhagen, Stockholm, Talinn, and St. Petersburg. I am not quite sure on weather, but I know in order to get off the ship in Russia, you need to either have a Russian Visa or book an excursion. Thought you may want to know. Have fun!

[PC168]

We are also going to the baltic & the Norweigen Fjord but in different weeks. However, you should goto the Ports of call forum and do a search, there are tons of good info there.

 

http://boards.cruisecritic.com/forumdisplay.php?f=192

[AussiePerth]

Hi we are doing the 14 days starting on the 6th July from Copenhagen. Any ideas welcome. :)

[beachluver9]

We have just returned from the 7 day Baltic cruise on the Musica on 6/15/13 followed by an additional week in Denmark.

 

The weather was typically unpredictable for us. Copenhagen was a very pleasant 18 (65) with some clouds. Kiel ended up being quite chilly at 15. Stockholm and Tallin hung around 17-18. St. Petersburg was fairly warm at 21.

 

The biggest thing to remember on this cruise is that buildings/museums, etc at the ports weren't air conditioned, so tended to be quite warm if not hot inside. If you keep a short sleeved shirt or tank top under a light jacket or sweater, you should be fine. The bldgs in St Petersburg were especially warm since they didn't open their windows there.

 

All temps on the ship were comfortable in short sleeves unless you are on deck.

[torrie]

Hi

We are cruising on the Musica from Kiel to Venice in September 2013. As we have a connection to make to Salzburg, we were wondering if anyone has an idea as to time required for disembarking at Venice. We have been told 1 hour and up to 4 hours before we can leave the ship. On contacting MSC they have advised us to cancel or rethink our tour from Salzburg. The tour from Salzburg is an organised tour and leaves on the 21/09/2013. Hoping that someone out there can give us a more realistic time frame.

[AmoMondo]

I can't see this cruise on the UK site so can't see your arrival time in Venice.

 

The last time I had a cruise end in Venice, I was off the ship at just after 10.30 with a docking time of 9.00. I was in one of the middle groups.

 

I would not bank on getting off in an hour. There are too many things that can go wrong to allow that. Venice sometimes has fog leading to delays. There are sometimes demos in the port that holds things up (there was when I embarked). It depends on how quickly the ship is cleared by local immigration. You may have to queue up to get your passports back. (It's not unusual for the first few groups to be off the ship whilst those with non EEC passports are waiting to get theirs back).

 

I'd say the most likely time is 1.5-2 hours aft docking for a "safe" timescale, and that 4 would only be if something goes wrong (like fog or a demo) or you're detoured to Trieste