I am looking for a guidebook that covers shore excursions from cruise ships that travel Helsinki, Talinn, St. Petersburg. I have looked on Amazon with no success. Any suggestions? Thanks.
I have used internet sources, mainly cruisecritic.com Most of the cruise lines sell shore excursions but you can usually find similar tours through local companies. After all the cruise lines use the locals. Are you looking for a tour to join? Or do you have a small group that you want to design a shore excursion for? Or are you looking for ideas of what to do on your own? Talinn is easy to do on your own. So is Helsinki, though a bit more planning is involved. You can get a good idea of what to see and do from almost any guide book, or from a website like Frommers or Trip Advisor. It is usually best to go with a tour in St. Petersburg because the Russian visa is pretty expensive for U.S. citizens and can take a pretty long time to get. If you are with an organized tour, you don't need an individual visa.
We have a good DK Eyewitness guidebook called "Cruise Guide to Europe and the Mediterranean". We used it for reference when we took a Baltic cruise last summer.
The only guide books I know for cruising cover the more popular Bahama/Caribbean cruise ports. For a Baltic cruise, you will need to consult internet sources (www.cruisecritic.com is a great one) and/or travel guides for each individual locations. Your cruise company should be able to provide you with the information on the shore excursions that they offer.