1 Day Imperial Saint Petersburg Highlights Tour Visas Included

I want to start by saying that the negative comments in the review are in no way a result of what the guide did or say. For a traveler American, the chance to see Saint Petersburg even for a day is huge, and understandably you want to make the most of it. This tour is designed to cover A LOT! So much that it is almost impossible to be enjoyable. If you arrive by a cruise ship, be aware people come at the meeting point at various times- some enjoy breakfast on the ship, some take a long time to get through the customs. The organizers do not want to leave anybody behind, and I appreciate that. Most likely the departure from the port will not be within 90 minutes from the ship arrival, it will be much later. The first attraction, Perterhof is one hour away from Saint Petersburg, that is two hours to spend in the bus. The park area at Peterhof is vast, you will need to walk fast from fountain to fountain to keep up with the group. Next stop, the Hermitage Museum is equally large and involves fast walking from room to room with barely any time to admire anything, snap pictures, breath. You need to constantly worry not to lose sight of the guide and the group and get lost in the pool of people. The third stop, the Savior on the Spilled Blood church is smaller in size, but when you get there, you will have probably run out of time and there will be barely a minute to stop and look around in peace. Our group was so rushed from place to place that took away all the pleasure of seeing the beauty around. There were a few breaks for bathroom and thank God nobody needed to go between, because I don't know how that would have worked. There was barely any time to take pictures, to get a drink, a bite, to buy a souvenir. Most of the attention was on concentrating not to get away from the group. The day in Petersburg might have been imperial because all the amazing attractions included, however the rush, fear of getting strayed from the group made the day more of a bad dream. A lot was revolving around getting in and out of the bus because it could not be parked close to the entrances. A designated spot for buses would resolve some of the stress.The guide was wonderful and knowledgable. She was doing her job. In my opinion less would be more with this tour. Eliminate one of the attractions and let the tourists enjoy.

The places visited were incredible. Valentina definitely was a great guide - definitely thought about the group and what they needed. Only issue was the crowded venues.

Our tour guide was very helpful and friendly, and knowledgeable. The company just hires contract tour guides, so I had to show her the itinerary so she knew where to take us. The first thing we hear is that they don't do tours of the Hermitage on Mondays, so we wouldn't be going inside. Other companies will go inside on Mondays, so pay attention to what day of the week you are booking! Note that you do not go inside the Peterhof Palace either - just the gardens outside the building. Our children (10 & 12) found this waaaay better. Lots of water features kids play in. Its a garden fit for a king. The church is very very nice inside. A tour guide makes a difference. Worth going on the tour just for this. We complained about the tour not going into the Hermitage, and after not getting to a satisfactory resolution with the tour company, Viator stepped in and got us a 50% discount (yaa Viator!). In short: if its not a monday, its a good tour.

Our tour guide (Catherine) was very knowledgeable, efficient, friendly, and energetic. She managed to get us into each attraction (Church on the Spilled Blood, The Hermitage, Peterhof) quickly. We would never have been able to visit so many interesting places without this tour. She also found us a good and authentic place for lunch, answered lots of questions, and had many great stories about the city and its history. A great success!

Poor visit we paid to visit everything but could not see the blood church as they don’t open on Wednesday and we wasn’t told about that. Not enough time to see the park and when we went to visit the royal place we had to see it in a rush and only one third of the palace. Do not recommend it to no one.

We loved everything! The excursion was very interesting and informative and the guide was nice, attentive and knowledgeable. Highly reccomend it to every traveller in St Petersburg!

Our Guide Tatiana and Driver Alexei were awesome and made our first visit to St. Petersburg a very memorable experience. I would highly recommend this tour to anyone.

Our cruise ship was in St Petersburg for one day only so I was a bit nervous about booking this tour due to the length of it and also the comments that you need to book with your cruise company. I didn’t need to worry though as we were picked up just outside passport control at 8.30am (90 minutes after docking) as indicated. We saw some wonderful sights with Victoria, our lovely and very informative guide, and were back at our ship by 6.15pm. It was a perfect day and a highly recommended tour.

Six of us from the US took this ST. Petersburg Highlights Excursions lead by our tour guide Katherine. We were greeted and welcome by Katherine once we passed the St Petersburg cruise terminal passport control. This warm welcome took lots of stress and confusion away from us as none of us speak Russian. The Mercedes Benz Tour van seats about 13-14 people. It worked nicely with a small group so we all could receive help, Q&A and attention from guide. The drvier was a nice gentlemen with great driving skills. Katherine was considerate, knows the city, history and Russian culture well. She was a super star and knows all the attractions at the back of her head. I have never seen a guide with such knowledge, patience, organizational and people skills. She is a really Keeper! A big Thank You from all of us to Katherine and her excusion company.

The tour itself was great, however VIATOR misinformed us, they said that there was no waiting whatsoever and that the tour would go ahead without anywaiting....that was B.S. we waited over one and a half houir in line, behind thousand of passengers, lining up freezing weather, it was snowing and the wind was howling 35 knts p/h, The bus did not have a toilet and the passengers were realy The blame should go toVIATOR that misguided the tour operatorupset as the wanted to go to the washrooms.