The seed for this cruise was planted by a single postcard — a postcard sent to my wife and I by our Personal Vacation Planner (PVP). (Thanks, Valerie!). The card promoted a few Carnival Cruise Line sailings, one of which included this Baltic cruise. One of the ports of call was St. Petersburg, Russia. That set in motion the plan to turn a decades-long dream into a reality.
Flights
I used Skyscanner to search for airfare to London. I set up a price alert with them so Skyscanner could notify me by email if prices changed for my selected flight. A couple of months before sail date, I got a price drop email from Skyscanner. The drop in price was almost half the original airfare. When I got home and saw that the fare was still available, of course I jumped on it. The flight was on Iberia. Iberia codeshares with American Airlines so I was able to get miles for the flight credited to my AAdvantage account.
Our route to London looked like this: Los Angeles (LAX) to Chicago (ORD) to Madrid (MAD) to London (LHR). Coming back, it was London (LHR) to Madrid (MAD) to Boston (BOS) to Los Angeles (LAX).
I must stop here to thank both Nomadic Matt and The Points Guy for the tips they share. I used just one tip from each of them during the planning stages of this trip. You just read the results in the second paragraph.
Cruise
For the cruise portion, planning started about 7 months out. I put a refundable deposit down with final payment due 90 days prior to sail date. One day before the final payment was due, Carnival announced a massive price reduction on their European itineraries. I jumped on this one, too. With the savings, we upgraded to a balcony stateroom and applied the rest to shore excursions. The cruise departed from and returned to Dover, England.
Itinerary
Our cruise was aboard Carnival Legend. Here is our itinerary:
| Day | Port |
| 1 | Dover, England (Embarkation) |
| 2 | At sea |
| 3 | Copenhagen, Denmark |
| 4 | Rostock (Warnemünde) and Berlin, Germany |
| 5 | At sea |
| 6 | Helsinki, Finland |
| 7 | St. Petersburg, Russia (overnight) |
| 8 | St. Petersburg, Russia |
| 9 | Tallinn, Estonia |
| 10 | At sea |
| 11 | At sea |
| 12 | Amsterdam, Netherlands |
| 13 | Dover, England (Disembark) |
Transfers
To get from Heathrow Airport in London to Dover to meet the ship, we purchased the airport-to-ship transfer through Carnival.
Excursions
All of the shore excursions except the tours in Amsterdam were booked through Carnival. The bike rental was purchased at MacBike in Amsterdam. The boat tour (canal cruise) was purchased with the bike rental as a combination package. The Hop On-Hop Off tour in London was purchased at our hotel.
Accommodations
Our overnight post-cruise stay in London was booked through Carnival, as was transfer from ship to hotel and hotel back to Heathrow Airport in London.
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