We decided to take back to back Norwegian fjiords and Baltic capitals cruises on the Norwegian Dream this June/July. We're booked in a balcony room on Norway deck. Any opinions, suggestions, etc?

Only to say that we had room 8007 (penthouse on Norway deck) when we were on the Dream and I loved it! It wasn't huge but had a nice sitting area and of course you could sit outside too. We free bubbly and prawns etc waiting for us in our penthouse when we arrived and chocolate strawberries one night too. The ship is big so you will get lost. The food was good, went before freestyle dining.

We were on the Dream two summers ago to the Baltic Capitals and loved it. Make sure that you see the Hermitage and Peterhof in St. Petersburg, Porvoo in Finland, and we biked in Stockholm. It was a wonderful trip. If you are going to be seeing London in conjunction with your trip I would recommend doing it before the cruise rather than after. Enjoy.

What is the Porvoo in Helsinki?<BR>With booking back-to-back cruises, Norwegian has given us 2 nights before and 2 nights after in London.<BR>Lots of talk on this board about taking liquor, soft drinks, etc. on board. How about Norwegian?

In St. Petersburg, consider hiring a private guide inside of doing the ship tour. It may be a little extra money but I thought it was well worth it based on the amount of places we got to see, we didn't have to wait for everyone else to get back on the bus and we got to tailor our itinerary to what we wanted to see. There are several operators that do NOT require you to get a visa to do a private tour, we used west-east but I understand they have a different name now and I've seen recommendations for Red October, which is run by the woman who used to run west-east. Check out the boards at www.cruisecritic.com for more private excursion info.<BR><BR>My second piece of advice is to try planning at least a couple of ports where you don't have structured excursions. At some point we went on church/palace overload and they all started blending together. Helsinki is a nice place just to wander about so are Copenhagen and Tallinn.<BR><BR>I thought that the sites in St. Petersburg were by far the most spectacular-try to fit in a visit to Peterhof, the Hermitage, Yusopov Palace and either St. Isaacs or the Church of the Spilled Blood. And try to arrange for some time for souvenir shopping, the market behind the Church of the Spilled Blood had a great selection of things to bring home.<BR><BR>I did up some notes when we got back from our cruise last year, Orient Lines though not Norwegian. If you'd like to see a copy, post here and I'll send them to you.

Kris-<BR>can you e-mail me your notes? We'll be on the Dream this summer, 8/5/02 and I'm doing research now. want to do private tours in St. Pete's but have to find 1 or 2 other couples to go.<BR>Thanks [email protected]

Kris, please email your report we will be on the Dream for the Aug 29th sail.<BR><BR>Susie, We are using Laura with Red October email her at [email protected]. Sorry I don't have the website address with me, she will try to but you with other couple(s) or send you enough tickets that you can ask someone from the ship to join you.

My husband and I took the Baltic Sea cruise on the Norwegian Dream last August. We came home September 10, 2001, but that's another story. The only ship organized tour we took was in St. Petersburg to the Hermitage and the Summer Palace for an evening concert. We hired a private car for one day run by the Russian Mafia. Yes, we obtained our own Visas prior to going. We took no other shore excursion, and found ourselves having a really great time in all the ports. If you feel comfortable with it, go on your own and explores the cities by yourselves. It will cost less, and you'll have more fun.