St. Petersburg Forum: Denrus Tours

Hi Glaswegians -

Our family of 5 (kids 21, 17, 13) is going on this Royal Carrib cruise in late July. I've contacted Denrus and they seem great, just wanted confirmation that RC won't make it difficult for us to disembark w/o Russian Visa and/or taking their ship-tour. We don't much enjoy the "cattle call" tours - but the ones you describe in Stockholm and Talinn sound nice -any other recommendations for ship, shore, etc? Thanks!

We just came home from a 2 week Baltic cruise. The ship will try to imply that if you don't have a visa, you can only go ashore on a ship excursion. This is NOT true for Russian "approved" tour groups. Four of us spent 2 days using ALLA tours (she was wonderful!) and I know Denrus and Red October are also on the approved list. In fact, we didn't use any of the ship excursions throughout the cruise and not only got to see all we wanted, but saved quite a bit of money.

Just arrived back from the Baltic Cruise with Royal CI and booked the 2 day value tour with Denrus.

There was a feeling that it would be made difficult to leave the ship at St P if you were travelling on an idependent trip - but we got to the departure area early and then approx 10-15 mins after those passengers departing for the Moscow trip had dis-embarked ,we walked off . I do not think there was any planned delay by the ship.

The second day , no delay at all.

As for the tour - there were 19 in total on the tour and we had Anna as our guide who was excellent .

The palaces , musems , churches , canal trip and the restaurants were all first class , I would recoomend the trip and Denrus.

Enjoy !

This issue of the ships trying to intimidate passengers into only booking ship tours comes up often. It does not come from the crew actually trying to delay or impede passengers, or denying exit....the crew knows better than try something like that.

The problem and apprehension comes from letters the marketing departments in the US send out claiming no one can get off the ship without a personal visa or booking with them...no exceptions. This is plain wrong and it makes passengers feel as if the cruise line might be lying about other things also.

Since these letters go out, obviously written by people who never read the laws or ever visited Russia, it is only natural that the majority of passengers become frightened into making less desirable choices.

A lie told, by a person in position of authority(in the eyes of the passenger) for the sole purpose of selling something to a customer who would have probably booked something else if not lied to is not legal and I am surprised some legal beagel has not sued them for civil fraud. It results in 10s of millions of dollars in sales for the cruise lines every year that they normally would not get.

The ships also claim that if booked on a private tour the ship will leave without the passengers if there is a delay. In the past 10 years, none of the independent reputable tour companies have ever had a passenger miss a sailing.. Besides, even if there was a delay, the port authority not the ship, decides if a ship can leave.

This fear of being left is really played upon in the marketing letters from the sales office of the cruise lines. Again, it is a lie.

We are sailing with Celebrity Cruise Line in August and have been reading the postings about booking tours with tour groups other than the ones offered by the ship. This is all new to me as we have only sailed once before, 5 years ago.

How do you find out about other tour companies such as Baltic Travel and Denrus? Where do you book them? Do they come directly to the port to pick you up?

Denrus is at www.denrus.ru and Baltic Travel is http://www.baltictravel.com/home.htm

The larger ships dock at the sea cargo port which is a secure area not accessible to the general public but the most of the tour companies can get port permits to pick you up at your ship.

Returned from SmarTours to St P and we used Denrus as our guide. Would advise to avoid for a myriad of reasons. Dishonesty, lack of being on time and having us wait at our meeting times, disregard for us waiting on the tour bus to take a 30 minute tea break, reserved cheapest boat dock, cheapest Russian dinner on last night, bringing us to a shop with inflated prices and commissions to tour guide and telling us the nesting dolls sold on the street were plastic (not true), not giving us time to stop and buy at the museum shops at all but rushing us on, was so late in the morning on one day that the bus driver went out of our way to pick the tour guide up at her corner!!! Her name was Olga and she's young and attractive with a sweet voice and knew her history and would be very late and say "Dear Friends...."" and of course she received no tips if any at the end. Our SmarTours guide complained to Denrus about her being used again. Take your chances with Olga. She can be charming but I don't pay to go all the way to Russia to get unreliable, shoddy service. On the other hand our bus driver was a young Russian male named Slava .. I think... He got BIG tips because he was always on time. He did have to be reminded to turn off the blaring music in Russian and sometimes he would park across the street instead of parking on the same side down the block. But that's okay. We didn't mind him driving on the sidewalk when the traffic stalled and he did make u turns in the middle of traffic. In the US that all equals tickets and fines but in Russia who knows. But he was skillful at it!! Try another tour company and try Denrus at your own RISK. CHansen

WE just got back from a Baltic cruise on Princess, WE used Denrus booked over the internet Our Guide was Katrin and she was great. She spoke very well and never missed a question. Picked up at the boat and delivered back at 11;00 and that was a long day made easier not having to mess with a bus and those problems. Well worth the money and saw much more than the cruise tours. and we did not need a visa

Is there any truth to the cruise ships making it difficult for those who have purchased tours through private tour companies difficult to get of the ship when in port?