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#1
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St Petersburg
My wife and I are considering visiting St. Petersburg next summer. I
believe that St Petersburg has some spectacular tourist sites (the Hermitage, Cathedrals, Nevsikj Palace…) but we are a little concerned about stories we have heard about crime and corruption. I suppose that we could avoid these hassles by paying for a tour but we would prefer to travel on our own. We have traveled extensively but I would have to say we are not particularly daring. So are we overreacting or should we be concerned. Is a tour worth considering? Thanks for any thoughts Steve Gerdemann |
#2
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St Petersburg
My wife and I are considering visiting St. Petersburg next summer. I
believe that St Petersburg has some spectacular tourist sites (the Hermitage, Cathedrals, Nevsikj Palace.) but we are a little concerned about stories we have heard about crime and corruption. I suppose that we could avoid these hassles by paying for a tour but we would prefer to travel on our own. Unless you live in a small town, St. Petersburg will have a lower crime rate than your American hometown. You will have a bigger problem with the language. Almost no one over 30 speaks English, and many young people are equally likely to speak German over English as their second language. A tour will solve the language problem. You could also split the difference and use a tour to arrange for the hotel, airport transportation, and visa, and extend your time and see the city on your own. Some places are worth a tour, like the Catherine Palace (Tsarkoe Selo). By the way, the Nevski Palace is a hotel. Pete |
#3
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St Petersburg
Taking a guided tour in St-Petersburg just for safety purposes, in my
opinion, does not make sense because this city is safer than other Western megalopolises. But you may want to take a tour if you want to learn more than your guidebook provides (Russian guides used to be pretty good, though it may not be true any more, with the proliferation of small tour operators), or just to deal with a language barrier. If you do it on your own, make sure to visit 2 sites missing from your list: Peterhoff (or Petrodvoretz) - arguably the most breathtaking tourist attraction in the world, and the Katherine Palace. Both are in St-Petersburg suburbs. Not sure what you mean by Nevsikj Palace. My wife and I are considering visiting St. Petersburg next summer. I believe that St Petersburg has some spectacular tourist sites (the Hermitage, Cathedrals, Nevsikj Palace?) but we are a little concerned about stories we have heard about crime and corruption. I suppose that we could avoid these hassles by paying for a tour but we would prefer to travel on our own. We have traveled extensively but I would have to say we are not particularly daring. So are we overreacting or should we be concerned. Is a tour worth considering? Thanks for any thoughts Steve Gerdemann |
#5
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St Petersburg
gerald schrieb:
One of the safest cities in Europe, which makes it much safer than anything in the western hemisphere. Would agree for the centre/hotel surroundings and for same size cities. Do not try outskirts at dark. Regards, ULF |
#6
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St Petersburg
Dear Steve,
I am a tour guide/interpreter in Saint-Petersburg. I would advise you to contact any central hotel like Nevsky Palace, Radisson, or Grand Hotel Europe, or Astoria. They will send you confirmation of your booking and you can use this confirmation as a legal paper for obtaining visa in your country. In Saint-Petersburg I would offer my services as a tour guide, as well I will provide you a transportation. I am working for a long time in this field and got many references from my former clients, I can refer you to them. Saint-Petersburg is a great city, much to see, much to do here. Don't afraid walking on your own - it is safe, especially in summer, at a time of famous white nights. English is the most popular foreign language in Russia. Let me know if you are interested. Feel free asking questions regarding your trip. Sincerely Elena ----- Original Message ----- From: "Steve Gerdemann" Newsgroups: rec.travel.europe Sent: Wednesday, April 07, 2004 10:38 PM Subject: St Petersburg My wife and I are considering visiting St. Petersburg next summer. I believe that St Petersburg has some spectacular tourist sites (the Hermitage, Cathedrals, Nevsikj Palace.) but we are a little concerned about stories we have heard about crime and corruption. I suppose that we could avoid these hassles by paying for a tour but we would prefer to travel on our own. We have traveled extensively but I would have to say we are not particularly daring. So are we overreacting or should we be concerned. Is a tour worth considering? Thanks for any thoughts Steve Gerdemann "Steve Gerdemann" ???????/???????? ? ???????? ?????????: om... My wife and I are considering visiting St. Petersburg next summer. I believe that St Petersburg has some spectacular tourist sites (the Hermitage, Cathedrals, Nevsikj Palace.) but we are a little concerned about stories we have heard about crime and corruption. I suppose that we could avoid these hassles by paying for a tour but we would prefer to travel on our own. We have traveled extensively but I would have to say we are not particularly daring. So are we overreacting or should we be concerned. Is a tour worth considering? Thanks for any thoughts Steve Gerdemann |
#7
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St Petersburg
Our visit to St. Petersburg in May/June 2003 has turned out to be one of our
greatest travel experiences. I won't say much were about the sights of the city as that info can be derived form any number of sources. Instead focus more on sharing some information about the city and the trip itself. The views from the train from Helsinki made us wonder what were getting in to as we neared St. Petersburg. There were derelict rail cars and junk along the tracks making a naturally dreary area look even more foreboding. Our arrival at the station in St. Petersburg didn't initially appear promising. There was rubble everywhere and the station was dilapidated. What we thought was a rusted out junk train turned out to be a commuter train still in active service. A most depressing first impression to say the very least. As we walked into the station we were having second thoughts and discussing the idea of cutting our planned 5 day stay and returning to Helsinki the following day. What a mistake that would have been! Beginning about 2 months prior to the trip, we had hired a private guide by contacting an email address found in an old Rick Steves' guide. Through several weeks of correspondence we had set up a loose itinerary and had made arrangements for him to meet us at the train station. Alexey was at the station as promised holding a sign with my name on it. Amid the chaos of the station, Alexey was a wonderful sight. We exchanged pleasantries and exited the station to one of the greatest cities I've ever visited. The next 5 days were fantastic and I was reluctant to leave. Everything there seems bigger than life and one can only imagine the grandeur of the city in the past. All those years of communism took their toll and there is a lot of the city in disrepair but work is progressing everywhere to restore the city to its former glory. Like you , we were concerned about the tales of crime and corruption we had heard. We were advised by our guide Alexey that those tales were greatly exaggerated. We walked the city extensively at all times of the day and night over the next five days both with and without a guide. We never found ourselves feeling unsafe and never saw any evidence to substantiate the warnings. All in all, we felt safer than we would have in most major American cities. I can't say enough good things about our guide Alexey. It was a lot more like traveling with a friend than with a hired guide. His English language skills are great and his knowledge of St. Petersburg extensive. I would highly recommend him to anyone. His name is Alexey Aleshechkin and he can be contacted at . St. Petersburg can be difficult if you can't read or speak a little bit of Russian. We too are very experienced travelers but found that the Cyrillic alphabet was confusing and multi-lingual signs were few. Having a guide/translator really helped and greatly expanded our enjoyment of the city. The flexibility was great. We were able to tailor each day to our specific wishes and not tied to any external schedules. A real advantage of a private guide is that you can avoid queues at places like the Hermitage and Peterhof.. While many busloads of tourists queued for entry, Alexey was able to gain immediate entry for us at every place we visited. Yet another advantage was the cost. While a 1/2 day packaged tour of St. Petersburg would have cost about $60-80 per person, our guide charged only $50 per day for the 2 of us (I believe his current price is in the $60/70 range per day total for 1-? people). As mentioned earlier, we were also able to set our own timetables and to linger anywhere we found really interesting. One of our guide's first questions to us was what kind of restaurants were we interested in. I told him that we would prefer to avoid touristy restaurants and visit the kind of places he would take his girlfriend to. We ended up visiting restaurants that had never seen a tourist or ever heard of a multi-lingual menu. We also ended up having some absolutely wonderful meals at ridiculously low prices. Most of our meals were less than $15 (total for the 3 of us) including a beer or two. We did a lot of walking and some travel via public transit. The subway system was a real adventure and a real exercise in quick thinking as we tried to understand the Cyrillic signs in time to make an exit. We found that a metered taxi cost about the same as it would in a US city but by having a native as a guide we were able to negotiate some really cheap rides in gypsy cabs (most any car you see is a potential taxi - just wave them down and negotiate a price before getting in). Rides anywhere within the city were typically less than 100 rubles (about $3.50). As for accommodations, we were most fortunate to accidentally stumble across a great hotel on the internet. The Marshal hotel is a small (11 rooms) boutique style hotel in a quiet industrial area near the Tavrichesky Palace and Smolny Sabor (monastery). ( http://www.marshal-hotel.spb.ru/ ) I believe a double room is there about $135 including breakfast. The hotel is about 1 block from the Neva River embankment and reasonable walking distance (for a good walker) to the Fortress of Peter and Paul, the Hermitage, Church of the Spilled Blood, and many other tourist highlights. The hotel was totally refurbished in 2001. It is quietly elegant by any standards and the multilingual staff very helpful. I love sharing my memories of this great trip so please don't hesitate to ask if you have any specific questions . -- (Remove both slices of mystery meat to reply!) "Steve Gerdemann" wrote in message om... My wife and I are considering visiting St. Petersburg next summer. I believe that St Petersburg has some spectacular tourist sites (the Hermitage, Cathedrals, Nevsikj Palace.) but we are a little concerned about stories we have heard about crime and corruption. I suppose that we could avoid these hassles by paying for a tour but we would prefer to travel on our own. We have traveled extensively but I would have to say we are not particularly daring. So are we overreacting or should we be concerned. Is a tour worth considering? Thanks for any thoughts Steve Gerdemann |
#8
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St Petersburg
Hire one of the gypsy taxi drivers by the day They are inexpensive,
knowledgable, speek some english, and will take you anywhere and wait for you. They will tell you "how to do it". This is poor advice. I have taken many gypsy taxis, and most drivers did NOT speak English. Even many regular taxi drivers do not speak English. Wait for you? Maybe, maybe not. Many gypsy taxi drivers are people on their way to somewhere and they will give you a ride (for a price) only because you will not delay them by much. Subrtact one star from each hotel rating. This is very true. Pete |
#9
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St Petersburg
Pete wrote:
I have taken many gypsy taxis, What an endearing image! What does this kind of taxi do- serenade you flamenco-style, or offer you a rose? David -- David Horne- www.davidhorne.net usenet (at) davidhorne (dot) co (dot) uk |
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