Baltic shore excursions for those with limited mobility

[danskerlady]

We are booked on an Azamara Baltic cruise this summer. My husband has some mobility issues -- he cannot do lots of stairs or walk long distances. Anyone know if there are elevators, etc particularly in St. Petersburg? Anyone used a private tour company that worked well. He prefers NOT to use a wheelchair if it can be avoided. Any suggestions or information on those ports -- Tallinan, Helsinki, Germany, etc would be appreciated. We have been to many of them before he had problem so we are familiar with Stockholm and Copenhagen. Thank you.

[xxoocruiser]

We are booked on an Azamara Baltic cruise this summer. My husband has some mobility issues -- he cannot do lots of stairs or walk long distances. Anyone know if there are elevators, etc particularly in St. Petersburg? Anyone used a private tour company that worked well. He prefers NOT to use a wheelchair if it can be avoided. Any suggestions or information on those ports -- Tallinan, Helsinki, Germany, etc would be appreciated. We have been to many of them before he had problem so we are familiar with Stockholm and Copenhagen. Thank you.

 

St. Petersburg - The Hermitage Museum has an elevator but most of the time it's not working. If it is there's still quite a walk to access it. If you are considering doing a river cruise tour while in St. Petersburg you need to know that access to the river boat is not street level. There are steps down to the boat that may or may not have hand rails depending the embarkation/debarkation locations. If you plan to do any of the Muesums really suggest he consider using a wheel chair. There's a lot of walking .

 

Tallinan - don't recall having access to any elevators

I did the basic city tour from the cruise line. Found it fairly easy at the time and very enjoyable.

 

Stockholm and Copenhagen , Again I just did the easy city tours and there was no locations on the tour that required to use an elevator for access. So can't tell you if elevators were even available.

[kitty9]

To see almost anything in St Petersburg, you'll find lots of stairs, and loads of walking. Like xxoo said, there is one elevator in the Hermitage, but the three times I was there, it was never working. The other problem is that the stairs don't have railings. Lots of stairs to get into palaces, but he might be able to get around the gardens of the palaces.

 

I'm surmising you're stopping in Warnemunde in Germany. There's not much there in the area, as this is a port for Berlin. They offer a train to Berlin for a tour that lasts around 10 hours.

 

Tallin has lots of cobblestones and can be rough to get around with mobility problems.

[englishgal]

We went to Baltic with Celebrity last August and it was a super cruise, but I could not have managed at any of the ports without my wheelchair. St Peterburg coach tour was really good, but to see any of the sights involves lots of walking and steps.

 

The places that you call into are all so great to visit, it would be a shame to miss them. Celebrity loaned me a wheelchair when my scooter would not go onto the coaches and they were extremely helpful at shore excursions to tell me whether or not I would manage them.

 

Do enjoy every minute of your cruise.:)

[violetta58]

Hi

I agree with the last poster , to do St Petersburg you do need a wheelchair if you have limited mobility like I do . We went last August on a Baltic cruise and used Alla tours for 2 days who were fantastic once they knew my needs ( many emails in preparation) . We had a people carrier and the driver was great at getting my wheelchair in and out at each attraction. Church of the Spilt blood had a ramp two nice russian man got out, only 3 steps if you don't want to use a chair. The Hermitage was wonderfull although very tiring in the heat. Our guide phoned ahead for the best access door and the lift was working fine. Again very tiring if I had walked. Peter and Paul Fortress again easy with a guide as the car could drive right up to the courtyard. Cobbles were a bit bouncey but only on small step into the church.

Don't miss Peterhof Palace and gardens - fantastic but a lot of walking ( or pushing for my husband) It has slopes down to the gardens so no steps. Again the guide was great and we spend around 3 hours there.

 

Tallin - very difficult, cobbles and hilly - best way is a taxi to the top or round and if you can walk down from halfway,

 

Copenhagen- nice and flat - easy to make a slow walk from the ship to town or along the front or a round the city coach tour.

 

Stockholm - good coach trip and the Vasa museum brillant and very accessable if you take a wheelchair.Sailing into Stockholm was fantastic

 

Oslo - shuttlebus to the square and easy to walk about.

 

It was the best cruise I have ever been on and we had a heatwave last August ( 89 degrees+ in St Petersburg) :)

 

Go and enjoy it.

[Giapetto]

Just wanted to say thanks for that post; it had more useful information in it than maost I have seen about baltic ports accessibility. We're off there with HAL in August and your info will really help us to plan where to go and where to stay aboard.

[kitty9]

If you can afford it, I highly suggest finding a private guide and driver in St Petersburg. I did that for one of my visits there, and it was the best tour ever. I did that tour through Denrus. They were able to take me to places that the tour buses don't, and, my guide was excellent with talking to docents at the various sites to get me the best access.

 

Helsinki's port is about a two minute walk to the town area. The sidewalks are even and flat. I took a boat tour of the city and surrounding islands that was perfectly accessible, and a short walk from the dock. There are also restaurants and a local market right in the port area.

 

Like I said in my previous post, there's nothing much in the port of Warnemunde, Germany. It's really a stopping point for a very long day's trip to Berlin. I did try to find a private car to take me to Berlin, but the cost was totally insane.....$1100. So I basically took a short walk in the port area and then stayed on the ship. I couldn't negotiate the ship's tour to Berlin because it was a lot of climbing onto and off tour buses, which I have a real problem with doing.

[fabnfortysomething]

we did a Baltics cruise last year just prior to my husbands hip replacement surgery.He was able to walk short distances with the aid of a walking stick and found steps easier to cope with than slopes

 

In Warnemunde we went to Berlin with SPB-we put together a party of 14 via cruise critic and SPB added another 4 people from another ship in dock that day-this brought the costs down to 100 euros each

we travelled in a full size coach with 2 other parties for the 2 hour drive to Berlin and then were transferred to a 20 seater minivan with private guide.This meant we were driven close to the main sites and had short walks.This was ok until the last stop across museum island when he was really starting to suffer-in retrospect we should have gone for a smaller group so he didnt feel the pressure to keep up with the rest of the group

 

For St Petersburg we went with another private tour guide-SPB also do St Petersburg but we wanted a tour with limited walking and they were pushing us towards a larger group again.We went with Anastasia but there are several other companies getting good reviews on cruise critic such as ALLA Denrus TJ etc

 

Because we were going for a reduced walking tour we didnt get any other people to join us as most people wanted to pack as much as possible in and we knew that would be too much exertion.However it worked out well with the 3 of us-hubby and our 18 year old daughter in a minivan with our guide and driver for just over 350 dollars each for the 2 days

 

Most people were wanting to get off the ship at 8 am to start their tours and this meant the immigration lines were very long-we met our guide 10am which meant the lines were much shorter

 

day 1 we started with a city tour with photo stops-being in a minivan meant we could get right up close and along the narrow canal unlike the large tour buses.We particularly wanted to see the subway system as the stations are very ornate.There is a moving escalator which my husband coped with-we went one stop along and then out again to meet our driver again

Next we had a hydrofoil ride along to the Peterhof gardens.We had been offered use of a wheelchair but my husband thought he could cope-use the wheelchair-the gardens are very extensive!!

For the next day the guide pre booked a wheelchair for the Hermitage which was well appreciated

also on the 2nd day we had a canal boat ride which was a highlight-there are steps down to the water edge and no handrail-could be tricky if you cant do steps well

We finished off with interior visits to St Isaacs and Church of spilled blood which were worth it

All in all would thoroughly recommend private guides for both these cities-just be sure you explain exactly what your mobility issues are

 

For the rest of the Baltic ports we thought we could get away with the HOHO buses-this had mixed results

 

In Copenhagen the bus stop was alongside the ship but there are 2 loop circuits so you do have to change buses to see the main sights

Tallinn-the ships dock a long walk to pier entrance where the buses are situated.no problem if youre fit but the hill from the old town up or down is a killer

Helsinki-we were getting a bit tired of HOHO buses by this stage

In retrospect I wish I'd done more research on private tours for these ports as initially I was put off the the high costs

 

hope the above helps

 

 

Lyn