RCL Serenade of the Seas-St. Petersburg excursion- Nevsky Prospect Walking Tour Query

[TDOTCRUISR]

Hi,

 

I will be on Royal Caribbean's Serenade of the Seas in 2 weeks. I am wondering if any past cruisers have done the Nevsky Prospect Walking Tour/excursion offered by RCL. It mentions that there may be time for some shopping. I am trying to confirm how much time/type of shopping available so I can determine how much Russian Rubles I should exchange (prefer not to use a credit card and probably won't be able to access an ATM since I will be with the tour).

 

Also not sure how this "free time shopping" would work if the entire tour group is supposed to remain "together" (due to visa situation)??

 

This will likely be the only shopping time I have during the 2 days in St. Petersburg. Day 1 will be a full day tour of the Hermitage and Peterhof, so this shopping break may be my only opportunity to pick up some souvenirs.

 

Any information would be greatly appreciated...Thanks!

[Carolla5501]

Not sure about time but the road probably had ATMs.

[NanciEA]

I have not been on this specific RCL excursion, however, I have been on a walking tour which included Nevsky Prospect. Our tour stopped at a shop which was an upscale candy store/deli which was very nice. If you bought something, even just a few candies, the receipt could be used to visit their very clean toilets. Some in our group who weren't interested in shopping did wander on the block outside to take photos. No problem. You just had to be ready to leave at the appointed time. There is also a great gift shop at Peterhof. We had lots of free time there to wander in the lovely grounds, which we did, but we also allowed ourselves time to browse in the shop. Again, we just had to be back at the bus at a certain time. The Hermitage, like all large museums has a wonderful gift shop as well. We did not use our free time there to shop because there was so much art work to see. I would definitely take Rubles and not worry about finding an ATM, as we did not make any specific stops for those. Perhaps we lost some in the conversion rate by getting them from our home bank, but we were very relaxed about not having to find an ATM and that was important to us.

[TDOTCRUISR]

Thank you both for responding. It has helped tremendously. I have read on these boards that there are ATM's, but wanted to have rubles on hand (don't want to encounter any card problems while abroad>I had my ATM card "stuck" in the machine once and it freaked me out) and since I am on a ship-run tour, I certainly don't want to inconvenience the rest of the tour group (that is, if they would even allow a pitstop at the ATM).

 

I appreciate the additional information about the Peterhof and Hermitage stores. I am not an avid shopper, but might want to pick up a momento for myself and some small souvenirs>afterall, it's St. Petersburg! Also wasn't sure if many/some of the small "token" souvenirs would be available in other ports (although someone did state that the stacking matryoshka dolls were widely sold in Tallin). I need to pick up a snow globe for my usual cruise sidekick who is unable to make this trip (she collects them).

 

Yes, I am one of those who feels uncomfortable unless I have the local currency on hand. One less stresser on a very port intensive cruise.

 

There has been lots of info on the boards about private St. P tours, but not much about ship-run ones (no reviews on the RCL sites). I was hoping that there would be more reviews about the excursions, about the ship (Serenade of the Seas) as the season progressed, but NO - it's so quiet. Usually, passengers have posted the menus, daily newsletters, etc...It's kind of strange...?? Makes me feel a little "unprepared".

 

Unfortunately, I just haven't had much time to research (private tours) so I booked with the ship for this time around. The full day at the Hermitage and Peterhof (10 hrs) will probably be exhausting, so I chose the Nevsky Prospect walking tour for day 2 to slow thing down and to have some time enjoying the ship.

 

At least the other ports are all doable without booking through the ship.

 

Again - Thanks!