St Petersburg Highlights City Tour

On your first day, this is the tour that puts the city in order. In three hours by car, with stops for photos and short walks, you see the ceremonial squares, the Neva embankments and the islands. You leave knowing what is where and which places you want to come back to. It stays outside the museums and cathedrals; if you want an interior, choose the versions with St Isaac’s or the Church on Spilled Blood.

The route

Palace Square. The Winter Palace, the General Staff arch and the Alexander Column, a granite monolith as tall as a sixteen-storey building that stands by its own weight alone. Your guide will also settle whether cows once grazed here.

Senate Square. The Bronze Horseman, which gave Pushkin’s poem its name, stands on the Thunder Stone. Your guide explains how the enormous rock was moved to the Neva without machines.

The Summer Garden and the Field of Mars. The city’s first garden, where Pushkin admitted to walking in his dressing gown. Next to it is the old parade ground that saw fireworks, elephants, Shrovetide pancakes and the country’s first Eternal Flame.

Trinity Square and the Mikhailovsky Castle. The spot where the city began, with its first square, port and market. Nearby is the castle Paul I built to feel safe, and where he was murdered forty days after moving in.

The Spit and the sphinxes. The Rostral Columns and the classic view across both arms of the Neva. On the University Embankment stand two sphinxes of Amenhotep III from the fourteenth century BC, the oldest monuments in the city.

Along the way. The Church on Spilled Blood, Kazan Cathedral and St Isaac’s from outside, Nevsky Prospect, the Anichkov Bridge with Klodt’s horses, Trinity Bridge, and views of the Peter and Paul Fortress and the cruiser Aurora.

Good to know

• The tour lasts about 3 hours by car, with the start time and meeting point agreed at booking.
• The car and guide are included; no entry tickets are needed.
• The pace is flexible: linger where you are interested and drive past what you are not.
• The tour can be booked privately or as part of a group. Meals are not included.

Who it suits

First-time visitors on their first day, cruise and business travellers with a few hours free, and families who want to see the city without long walks.