We took an Egypt tour with Grand Circle. We're now looking at a Globus Russian river cruise. Globus is about half the price of GC for Russian cruises. Has anyone tried both? How do they compare?

Have you examined the brochures side by side? Is there any obvious reason for the difference in price - different # of days, class of hotel, meals/activities included?

It's hard to comment without having been on both tours - which I don;t imagine anyone here has.

I've only tried GCT's Danube river cruise but can tell you that for the money it's a heck of a deal; I don't know how the company can put on such a good tour for the price charged.

Thanks. Can anyone comment on Globus?

You might also post your question in the Cruise forum.

I went to Russia on a Globus trip this past summer - but it was a land tour, not a river cruise. I'm typically not a tour person, but overall I was very happy with the trip. Globus used four-star, very well located hotels in Moscow and St. Petersburg. The tour director was excellent, as were the local guides used in each of the cities. We took all the optionals in Russia, and I personally found most of them to be interesting. We did have opportunities for free time in most locations, if desired. My trip report and photos are here:

http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=34654471

I compared a lot of different options and basically did what nytraveler suggested above: I basically put them all side by side and looked at itineraries, location/quality of hotels, number of meals, included sites versus optional charges, etc. FWIW, we did look at the river cruises and very well might have gone that route, but were a little late in the going to book for our preferred dates (we booked in April for a July trip).

Enjoy! I thought Russia was fascinating and I'm looking forward to going back at some point.