Baltic Excursion ideas?/ good guide book?

[LKJ]

Would certainly appreciate some ideas for our Oceania Baltic cruise excursions for Aug 15 - 29th. So far we have a 3 day tour in St Petersburg with DenRus reserved. From other posts, it appears that many cruisers enjoy on your own days in the other ports. Have just sent an email inquiring about a taxi ride into Bruges, since Oceania doesn't have shuttles at the ports.

 

Our ports are Bruges, Amsterdam, Warnemunde,Copenhagan,Gdansk,Helsinki, St P, Tallinn and Stockholm.

 

Also, is there a MUST HAVE Guidebook that would be good to buy?

 

Certainly appreciate any information on great things to do in the ports and a guide book recommendation. :) Thanks ahead of time!

[gratefulguy]

There may not be only one guide book that covers all those countries! One for "Europe" might leave out St.P and Tallinn, etc. If you are close to a large bookstore (Borders, B&N, or a good Independent), you could get an overview of the different styles each publisher has. There are series which are aimed at UK readers, some that concentrate on young or budget, some for art & architecture. Some of the books have maps that cover only the central/tourist areas--no help when you're trying to see where the ship docks in relationship to transportation or sights nearby. If you have more than a few hours in a port, you may want to get a good, large scale map or street guide. I'm going to the Baltics/Scandinavia soon, and have bought Insight and Rough Guide books (and also a Berndtson laminated folding map of St. Pete), from Borders and Bookstar. Fodor's now has many different series for the same area, so you can find anything from very small to comprehensive. Of course, a good library is a resource, too. The web-sites of the countries/cities can be a big help with the most current transportation and event news. You might also look on CC for threads from the other cruise lines that go to the same ports--lots of planning tips get discussed pre-cruise, and reports of good/bad experiences post-cruise!

BTW, if the Warnemuende stop on your cruise is for a "quickie" day-trip to Berlin, IMO, Berlin deserves its own trip! You could probably find a low-cost European/British airline to take you to Berlin before or after your cruise, and see Berlin, Dresden, and Leipzig. I was there, for the first time, last October, and was glad I had 8 days.

Happy Cruising

[LKJ]

Appreciated all your helpful tips. Thanks and have a great 4th of July!

[JodiBB]

We used Rick Steve's Scandanavia guide book, which had all our visited countries except St. Petersburg. We appreciated the walking tours and the recommended things to see....helped us make decisions as to what to do/see.

[LKJ]

Hey, thanks JodiBB. I've seen reference to this book and will see if Borders has it or order it online from Amazon.com. Whatever helps for our 1st trip to Europe. Looking forward to checking it out.

[MacTosh]

Exactly one year ago, we were aboard the Jewel of the Sea/RRC doing their Baltic cruise. Other than St. Petersburg, we handled all our own sightseeing at each port; depending upon Rick Steves' Scandinavia,The Rough Guide to Scandivania & Internet sources.I can't imagine any better sources.**For any shoppers interested in special fly fishing/lures/souveniors, check out Schroeder Sport Shop in Helsinki/Senate Square/Unioninkatu ~ delightful shop, with friendly help.

You will find Tallinn extremely easy to walk ~ and equally delightful place to visit. Vasa Museum takes some effort to get to but well worth it ~ otherwise, Stockholm is an easily walkable city.

[LKJ]

Thanks for your response.

 

Have seen other recommendations for the same guide books. Also saw a few posts for AAA Spiral Guides that people liked, but didn't mention any for Scandinavian countries. Certainly would be nice to have a small lightweight bound guide.

 

Also, what other "internet sources" have you found most helpful? Perhaps the ports we're going to all have tourism web sights for the cities?

[freddiebud]

Hey, thanks JodiBB. I've seen reference to this book and will see if Borders has it or order it online from Amazon.com. Whatever helps for our 1st trip to Europe. Looking forward to checking it out.

 

I got this book from overstock.com for less than list. It is great in planning my vacation.

[gratefulguy]

Here are some links:

http://www.goscandinavia.com , http://www.visitdenmark.com , http://www.gofinland.org , http://www.saintpetersburgvisit.ru , http://www.cruisebaltic.com

If you do a search on Google, etc., you can find the others!

[LKJ]

Will certainly check those out. Google searchs are so good for finding out anything. It's amazing. Have just been too busy with the July 4th weekend to try that yet. Thanks a bunch for the headstart gratefulguy! These posts are definitely a wonderful venue for helping others with ideas.

[gratefulguy]

Just trying to "give back". Before my first cruise (just last May), posters on these boards helped so much in sharing info that made everything easier. I leave in three weeks for the next one, and I'm reading these threads everyday!

Thanks to all who share.

Louis

[tclowe]

In addition to Rick Steves' book, I like Lonely Planet's Scandinavian Europe. This book covers Denmark, Finland, Tallinn, St. Petersburg (very brief), Iceland, Sweden, and Norway. It also has great small city center maps with actual street names (vs. Steves' cute hand drawings). These maps have markers where sites, restaurants, and etc. are located on the map.

 

Plus, it has a list of mid-range restaurants and cafes that we can try while in each city.

 

Happy Planning.

[Marialivia]

The most helpful "guidebook" I found for my recent Baltic cruise was a website, www.portreviews.com, from which I was able to print detailed, complete info on each of the ports we visited.

There is also an accompanying message board.

Happy travels!

ML:D

[mmmmm]

I found that Rick Steve's book can be sliced into sections with a box cutter (many gentle slicings) and the pages stay together well. I usually "bind" each section with a lenth-wise strip of 3/4" tape to help, and then I have nice light-weight thin booklets on each port. His walking tours and ratings of things to see are usually great althought I think his maps sometimes leave something to be desired.

[readinglady]

We just got off the Rotterdam to the Baltics today and also used the Rick Steves Scandanavia book. It was invaluable. We did all of his walking tours. We also went to several of the restaurants that he recommended.

[dbh62ark]

I traveled on Baltics cruises twice and found that the best guide book for us was the Frommers Scandinavia book. We did use Rick Steves for the walking tour in Tallinn, but I didn't like his book for other ports as compared to Frommers. The Frommers walking tours are great. We don't really like the EyeWitness guides for use on the ground because the detailed information (opening and closing times, etc.) is usually dated or nonexistent, but we did like the St. Petersburg EyeWitness guide because we used a guide there (Denrus) for all the practical details.

 

Have a great trip,

Donna

[MTemple212]

We also did the Rick Steve's Scandinavia guide book walking tours and were very enjoyable and easy to do.

[mmmmm]

I actually thought Rick Steve's walking tour of Tallinn was the least useful and most confusing of his walking tours.:) But I never looked at the one's by Frommer. Next time...

[dbh62ark]

I actually thought Rick Steve's walking tour of Tallinn was the least useful and most confusing of his walking tours.:) But I never looked at the one's by Frommer. Next time...

Yes, his walking tour of Tallinn was confusing! But we had a hard time finding information for that port, so it was better than nothing for us. For the other ports, I compared his against the Frommers and liked Frommers much better. We've also used Lonely Planet, Fodors, etc. and found that Frommers works best for us (many years traveling to many places in Europe).

 

Happy travels to all,

Donna