Just came back from an August Baltic cruise on Princess.
Best cruise ever-the cities are amazing. However, i agree that if you can afford a more luxury cruise line that gives you 2 nights and 3 days in St. Petersburg,book it!
If you cannot,book a cruise that has you in St. Petersburg on a Saturday and Sunday. Why? Traffic! There is none on weekends! St. Petersburg is also a city to definitely use a local tour company. We went with SPB tours and had a group of 4! The other couple we toured with was on a SilverSea ship but it was no problem with pickup and dropoff with our small size group. We paid $150 less than the megabus ship tour and had valet service at all of our sites with our own driver and guide-we could leave our valuables in the van which was locked and the driver stayed in sight at all times-very nice considering the huge numbers of pickpockets at sites. We saw and did more in less time than those who opted for ships tours. Our guide was amazing,her name was Maria, and our driver was Max-so dear. The owner of this company-Vikortia- makes a point of meeting all of her customers at the port to make sure we had a great visit! She entrusts her 2 gorgeous children to Max to drive them around so we knew we were in excellent hands.
We got in extra early at the Hermitage and with our tiny group we slipped past the huge groups of 30+ and were often the first people let into rooms at the Hermitage. They also took us to really great small local restaurants for authentic Russian lunches and no lines there either.
I would say that the cruise line itself is less important than the itinerary.
Do not miss Tallinn,Estonia-what a jewel of a city. And if you can spend as much time in Stockholm as possible do that too.
I hope to take my daughter back but will most likely NOT choose Princess as they had a very short time in Stockholm. Celebrity had better itineraries out of the London area than Princess. I agree that the cruises that start/end in Copenhagen/Stockholm are a great idea-like Seabourn or SilverSea. The couple who were on SilverSea did not seem to think their food was that great though.I was also disappointed with Princess food on this cruise compared to other cruises with them. I wonder if there is just a problem with food suppliers in that part of the world?