A word about our services...

1. Guide Services In Moscow,  Saint Petersburg and Kiev - hire your own English-speaking guide. The first-time traveler to Russia often does not realize how difficult it can be to navigate themselves in a country with a completely different alphabet and a completely different language.

Quite simply, our guides are usually the key element of a guest's successful visit. It becomes a tremendous, fulfilling, exciting adventure because of the guide's knowledge, skill and personality. See for yourself what our service has meant to other travelers by clicking here, or reading some of the reviews below.

Let us help you to have the time of your life here. We can have a guide and driver waiting for you at the airport easily. Email our customer service manager Lena Morozova, and she will be happy to discuss your approaching visit and how we can be of assistance to you.

2. Our story and why we are different...

This service is operated by American Ed Ryder of the Philadelphia area. (That's me!) In June 2000 I visited Saint Petersburg for the first time. I traveled there with a handful of fellow Russian language students from West Chester University as part of a study program. Saint Petersburg blew me away! Holy cow... I almost couldn't believe it. The city impressed me enormously and ultimately I became a proponent of travel to this city through the creation of this service. Since March 2002 we have been serving foreign visitors to this city. Initially, I went crazy visiting the hotels over there. Back in 2002 there were only around 100 hotels in all of Saint Petersburg, and many of them were C R A P P Y. Yes, crappy. That is the word. I took photos and wrote reviews. (You can find them through the links above.) The pace of change in Saint Petersburg became stunning. So many new cafes and restaurants and shops and hotels opened. Oh my... so many new hotels. Within a few short years, Saint Petersburg's hotel infrastructure improved tremendously. And now a very nice selection of hotel choices exists. (We added more hotel reviews in 2004. But after that we stopped.)

This business was like an exciting hobby for me at first. I loved helping the people. But the burden of all of the correspondence became too much for me. So for several years Lena has been expertly handling this function. Sometimes there are email problems with spam filters. If there is ever a delay of more than 24 hours with your correspondence with us, please send me a quick email so I can rectify any service problem: Ed... asummerinrussia@aol.com

The other key member of my team is Sasha. He is a professional manager and he oversees all aspects of service delivery. He's also a highly regarded guide.

All of our guides are proven and all have experience with foreigners who have high expectations.

Our main strength is Saint Petersburg, but we can also arrange service in Moscow with adequate advance notice. (There is a shortage of guides in Moscow.)

Kiev in Ukraine is a nice city to visit. We have guide abilities there too. Please contact us for details.

In fall 2007 we made a video presentation. If you've got a high speed connection, check it out. Lena gives our pitch. CLICK HERE

Saint Petersburg is such a fascinating city. Do yourself a favor and plan for a minimum visit of 5 days. Seven to 9 days would be best! And have a guide with you each day. It will make a huge difference in the success, comfort and enjoyment of your stay.

EMAIL LENA
-now-
for your consultation

You can waste a lot of precious Saint Petersburg time by not having a local helper with you. When you hire a guide, everything becomes easier. It's like having a new friend. And they take away the stress, anxiety and uneasiness that can happen when you visit a very foreign country.

(I'm a crazy traveler and I use guides all the time. That's why I believe in them so much.)

We all feel good when a customer writes us praise for a job well done. Below are some oldies. (Our website has become a bit dated. I'll update it in the future.)

Thanks for considering us!

Ed Ryder

# # #

A Small Sample From Our Collection Of Customer Feedback (our customers love us):

Just wanted to drop a line saying how happy we were with Sasha. First, let me say my wife, Carol, and I were not even sure if someone would be there when we left the ship in St Petersburg, coming from NY, there are so many scams who knows what is real or not. We were in hopes of someone to take us to the most popular places and hopefully understand his broken English. so, when Sasha spoke English as well as I do and knew so much about everything from the paintings in the hermitage and Russian museum we were thrilled. He took us places we didn't expect to go and knew all the history about everything. When the day and a half was over and we were back on the ship, the three other couples who were at our table talked about what they did on the cruise tours. We saw so many more places and did so much more it was unbelievable. What is really crazy is that we spent less money for the guide and driver than they did, and that includes our visas. we would recommend your guide service with Sasha anytime.

Thank You

Carol & Artie

Hi Ed,

Thanks to your entire team for providing exceptional service from start to finish on our recent two day tour of St. Petersburg, Russia. While planning our itinerary for our Baltic Sea Cruise I was very unsure of how to plan our two days in Russia. I was very hesitant to book the tours offered by our cruise line but I was also nervous about getting Russian visas and using a service not affiliated with our ship. We flipped a coin and decided to risk it with your service. It turned out to be the highlight of our entire vacation and one of the most amazing experiences of our lifetime.

Lena provided excellent communication and good advice. Andrei made getting Russian visas easier than getting our passports renewed. Our driver, Mikilai, provided a clean, comfortable car, was always on time and friendly. Our guide, Veronica was terrific. She navigated us through and around crowds with ease, took us to the best places to shop and shared her vast knowledge of art, history and culture. She was great a tailoring the tour to our specific needs, like taking us to a Russian version of Starbucks, arranging a private canal tour when traffic congestion meant we might not make it to the water, and finding us clean bathrooms without long lines. We were able to see more in two days than most people see in two weeks and we were still able to enjoy a cup of coffee or Russian beer and talk about daily life. It was an experience that we will never forget.

Our sincere gratitude,

Wendy & William  

What a pleasure it was to spend the better part of 3 days with Lena Morozova as our personal guide in St. Petersburg, Russia during White Nights season in June 2005.

Lena spoke perfect English and was extremely knowledgeable about Russian art, architecture and history. She was a lively and charming person to be with and we were very reluctant to leave St. Petersburg, and Lena in particular.

We have been privileged to have had some superb guides during more than 50 years of travel to some of the most exotic and difficult places for tourists to visit throughout the world. Lena is at the head of the class in this regard.

Prior to our trip, we had three months of extensive email correspondence with Lena about our interests. Given the time constraints of less than 3 days at our disposal, she did a superb job of avoiding the throngs at all the attractions during the height of the St. Petersburg tourist season or getting us through them easily when necessary... and covering all the ground we planned to cover.

How can anyone possibly know as many special routes to the best toilets in the massive Hermitage while almost everyone else had to stand in long lines to visit the lesser-quality ones? Don't laugh... this is more important than it may seem to you if you've never been there before.

Amazingly, Lena was eight months pregnant when she first started corresponding with us, had her beautiful, healthy Diana a month later and was spending long days touring with us just two months after that.

Our only regret... not spending more than three days in St. Petersburg with her.

Here's to our next visit, Lena!

Ed,

We just returned from our trip to Finland, Russia and Estonia and I thought I would provide a few comments about our experience with the Russian Guide Network in St Petersburg.

Prior to the visit, communications with Lena and Sasha were responsive and very helpful. Both Lena and Sasha were extremely informative and what they told us was accurate when we were on the ground in St Petersburg.

We arrived on time, but it took us an hour plus to get through passport control at the port, but Sasha and Anatolyi, our driver, were patiently waiting. In minutes we were off to Catherine's Palace. Sasha, as he was throughout the trip was informative and handled all of our questions. He was polite and friendly and an incredible help getting in and out of places that were just full of other tourists. The driver was highly professional and always waiting for us in the exact spot, Our second stop was to have been Peterhof, but the back road was closed so Sasha adjusted the itinerary and we continued on without any lost time. I don't know how we would have seen as much as we did without Sasha's outstanding services. When we got back to the port on the second day, we felt that we knew something about that wonderful city and its fantastic history. Sasha was always considerate of our needs. In fact, I think we could have moved at an even quicker pace, but he was thinking of our comfort. I would recommend Sasha and the Russian Guide Network without hesitation. We feel that we got our money's worth!

Thanks again, we had a great time and thanks to Lena, Sasha and Anatolyi for all the wonderful support!

Ed ...You may recall that on the night I got back from our recent trip to St. Petersburg and London I sent you a short email to thank you for your services and to say that Lena is a world-class guide, and that you are to be congratulated for having her as your key person in St. Petersburg.

I want to elaborate on that opinion since, in the last several weeks since our return, we have had a number of occasions to discuss our trip with friends who have also visited Russia but, unfortunately, not with your company or your guides.  Some of their comments
convince us that your organization turned what might have been just a good trip into a great one.  Lena is not only a very attractive lady with wonderful "people skills", but a fantastic organizer.  Drivers, etc. were where they were supposed to be, when they were supposed to be there.  Tickets were in hand from every important visit and event - none of the standing in long lines for our group.  As far as events to see (or not see), things to do in our spare time, seating at performances, etc., were concerned, Lena consistently provided very good advice.  She is not only very knowledgeable as a tour guide, but clearly willing and able to learn new facts.  I had the pleasure of being in international banking for over 40 years, and in that time have traveled to almost every major country in the world (except China).  In that time I have met a lot of people abroad, taken part in dozens of trips and activities, and met my share of guides.  I can't remember ever having met a better corporate representative, or a more talented spokesperson for her country and city, than Lena.  Again, you are lucky to have her.

Thanks again for a wonderful experience.

 

Date: Tuesday, August 16, 2005, 5:36:22 PM
Subject: Guiding Service in St.Petersburg/August 13-14

===8<==============Original message text===============
Dear Sasha,

Thank you very much for choosing Tanya as my guide. Apart from her degree in
architecture she has a vast knowledge of history and art and it is difficult
to find a question she does not know the answer to. She is very attentive and
considerate and a good organizer. She is a charming person and it is a real
pleasure to be with her. She made my third visit to Sankt Peterburg a great
success and I hope you will give her the opportunity to do that for many
other people as well.

By the way, what would you think of updating your website? The "other"
Tatiana at the end of the site is "having a baby" for five years already.
Seems a bit long. And the picture of "my" Tatiana does in no way justice to
what she looks now!

It was a pleasure to work with your organization and if the case should
occur I shall certainly recommend it to other people.

Kindest regards.

Hans
 

Hello Ed,
Many thanks. We have the refund check in hand. We would have loved another day with Lena but while we will return to St. Petersburg we felt we'd never have a better opportunity to see Moscow. We do want to say that Lena was the deciding factor in us choosing your services. Our friends had used another agency but I immediately connected to Lena's first e-mail. She responded quickly, in perfect English and answered every question we had. She continued to do that throughout our correspondence-separating each question and providing a detailed answer. That takes both time and dedication. She was informative, organized and really cared that we had a positive experience. While we could have been assigned another guide (you offered many highly trained guides) we were thrilled that Lena could be our guide. Meeting her was such a pleasure. She made our stay in St. Petersburg so special. I was amazed how well she could accommodate to our needs-as my husband and I had different interests. Lena knows her city but she also knows how to  making touring fun. I can hardly wait to refer her and your service to our family and friends. She's an outstanding professional.  

Dear Ed Ryder and Lena Morozova,

Have recently returned from our trip to Russia and would like to take this opportunity to tell you how much we enjoyed the services of Anna Koroleva when we were in St. Petersburg. Our visit to Peterhof, on our last day, was to be the crowning event of our trip to Russia. It was!!
Anna met us at our hotel and guided us to Peterhof, via Hydrofoil. On our arrival at Peterhof she expertly guided us around the crowds and into the Palace, circumventing having to wait in line. Her knowledge of the palace and it’s history was excellent.

Jean and I thoroughly enjoyed our day with Anna. She is highly entertaining, enthusiastic and has a wealth of knowledge about Russian history.

You can be assured that when we encounter people that are planning to travel to St. Petersburg we will definitely recommend your services and Anna specifically. Our travel agent has also been alerted to how satisfied we were with the Russian Guide Network.  

Dear Ed Ryder and Lena,

We would also like to take this opportunity to tell you how much we enjoyed the services of the Moscow guide and driver provided by Russian Guide Network.

On our arrival in Moscow it was so nice to have Vladimir meet us outside Customs/Immigration. Having just spent sixteen hours in flight he was a very welcome sight. He did a marvelous job of navigating through the city traffic and getting us to our hotel.

Tanya Kalinina, along with Vladimir, met us the next day to visit historical sites outside of the city. Tanya did a wonderful job of guiding us through the sites and answering, or getting answers to, the many questions we asked. A couple of days later Tanya guided us around the city where we used various means of transportation. While we would never have attempted to use the Metro on our own (especially during rush hour), having Tanya there we really enjoyed the experience.
Tanya and Vladimir again teamed up to take us out to Sergeyev-Posad, on our last day in Moscow. Both are very skilled at what they do. We really enjoyed Tanya’s openness, enthusiasm, and genuine love for her country and it’s history.

------------------------------------------

Below is a feedback from my cruise ship customers whom I handled ...
early in August. By the way, Michelle is Wanda's personal assistant.

Regards,

Sasha

This is a forwarded message
From: Michelle
To: Alexander Sergayev
Date: Thursday, October 20, 2005, 8:59:16 PM
Subject: August 7 & 8

===8<==============Original message text===============


Sasha,  I know I should have e-mailed you sooner but time slips away and we all get busy.  Anyway, I just wanted to tell you a BIG THANK YOU.  Wanda, Ray, Nancy, Raj, John and Jane came back with glowing reports of how wonderful you were and what a great time they had and were thanking ME profusely for making it happen!

I will surely remember you to anyone I know going your way.
In the meantime, I hope you have your fair city back to yourselves and will have time to rejuvenate before all the cruisers and tourists arrive again next year.

Many thanks again,
Michelle

See Guide Profiles And Read More Testimonials by clicking here.
 

For service please email
Customer Service Manager
Lena Ulko
russianguidenet@mail.ru or russianguidenet@mail.com

 For other inquiries, contact Ed Ryder   asummerinrussia@aol.com

Assisting Travelers In 2002, 2003, 2004, 2005, 2006, 2007, and now 2008!
Go With Experience!

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Church Of Spilled Blood, St. Petersburg
...27 years of magnificent restoration work was completed recently.