Itineraries for Eastern Europe
Typical Tour Routes for Trips Through the Eastern Bloc and Russia
Jun 9, 2007
If you’re a fan of organized tours, then you’ll be pleased to know that the options for tours around Eastern Europe are rapidly increasing, as demand gets higher from tourists who want to experience fascinating cities like Prague, Budapest or Warsaw, or who want to explore beautiful sights like the Croatian coast or Czech or Slovak castles.
Overview of Key Tour Destinations in Eastern Europe
As the tour market for Eastern Europe develops further, more destinations are becoming a common part of the tourist brochures. Imagine twenty years ago, when such a market barely existed, and now it’s exploding! At the moment, however, most tours are still focused on some key destinations, especially in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland and Croatia, and to a lesser extent the Baltic nations of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Quite a number of tours also operate in Russia, but usually to the exclusion of other countries: after all, Russia is a massive land!
Perhaps the most common tours take in parts of Poland like Warsaw, Krakow and Auschwitz, proceed west to Prague in the Czech Republic, continue south through Vienna and might include some time along the Danube before ending up in the Hungarian capital, Budapest. Whether by train, bus or boat, such a tour does take in a large number of interesting sights in these three countries: from war history in Auschwitz, socialist architecture in Warsaw, a royal palace in Krakow, a castle in passing in the Czech Republic, and a gorgeous Old Town in the form of Prague, and finally a Danube highlight with a city tour of Budapest, hopefully including a dip in the Gellert Baths. It’s a good way to get quite an informed impression of Eastern Europe in a relatively short time, and with minimal distances, you do spend most of your time sightseeing rather than traveling.
An interesting alternative is to take a Baltic city tour, including Tallinn and one or both of Riga and Vilnius. Helsinki and St Petersburg are often thrown in to such a mix, and the combination of Russian, Soviet and Baltic history and culture will give you quite an insight into this north-eastern corner of Europe. Traveling time can feel a bit longer between these cities, so where possible go for tours that also include some interesting countryside stops.
Russian tours most often include St Petersburg and Moscow, with an excursion to a Golden Ring town while based in Moscow. If you want to extend beyond this, then the best way is with some kind of Trans-Siberian experience, and you’ll need a fair bit of time for such a journey.
Tips For Picking the Right Eastern European Tour
Check the size of the tour: usually, the smaller the better. Small buses are much easier to maneuver around narrow Old Town streets, and you won’t spend precious time waiting for the whole fifty-person group to reassemble before moving to your next destination. And while English-speaking guides are obviously important, try to find companies that use locals rather than native English speakers, so that you can get a better flavor of the real people in the countries you visit. Finally, check the destinations and the time spent carefully. If you’re especially interested in countryside and castles but the tour scoots through these places with just a thirty minute stop, find a different company.
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