Stylish Return to Days of the Czars : St. Petersburg palace tour is one of many excursions on Cunard’s Baltic cruises.

Outside 18th-Century Pavlovsk Palace, the most elegant of all the summer palaces of the czars, a brass band in red, blue and gold uniforms strikes up a rousing march. Inside, four footmen in ruby velvet knee breeches and three pretty young women in pastel hoop-skirted silk gowns, all of them wearing powdered wigs, are waiting with silver trays of champagne and caviar.

After a tour of the palace and a concert by a 12-piece chamber ensemble, the guests depart by horse-drawn carriages driven by costumed Cossacks. The band marches behind. Each woman among the guests has been presented with a big bouquet of roses still sparkling with dew.

This private afternoon at Pavlovsk Palace, exclusive for passengers aboard Cunard’s elite Sea Goddess I Baltic cruises this summer, is the highlight of a full two-day visit to St. Petersburg. Optional excursions on this high-end cruise, priced at $8,500-$9,200, include an evening performance (on our cruise, the ballet “Giselle”) and daytime tours of the Hermitage, Peter and Paul Fortress, St. Isaac’s Cathedral and Catherine the Great’s summer palace at Pushkin.

Because the 116-passenger Sea Goddess has a shallow draft, it is able to dock close to the heart of the newly renamed city, only steps away from the Winter Palace and the Hermitage, rather than in the commercial port farther out.

For anyone who last visited St. Petersburg when it was still Leningrad, the mood is definitely up. The old women in babushkas who stand guard in the museums have blossomed with a dab of rouge and lipstick and a shy smile for foreigners, and wherever a tour bus stops, young entrepreneurs swarm around with armloads of T-shirts, nesting dolls and rabbit-fur hats for sale.

Travel restrictions have lightened as well. While cruise passengers traveling on the ship’s group visa are still required to be part of an escorted tour when they leave the vessel, the interpretation of “tour” can be as modest as one or two people with a previously arranged car and driver.

To travel about freely in St. Petersburg, it is necessary either to arrange a personal visa prior to leaving the United States or, in a recently added option, to buy a temporary regional visa for $25 from the port authorities on arrival in St. Petersburg. The latter allows travel throughout the greater St. Petersburg area for the time the ship is in port.

Sea Goddess I will make two more sailings this season with the same exclusive visit to Pavlovsk Palace included. This Saturday’s departure, probably out of the question for any but the most impulsive traveler, will leave from Copenhagen and call at Rostock, Germany (with a complimentary full-day tour of Berlin); Gdynia, Poland; Helsinki, Finland; St. Petersburg; Tallinn, Estonia, and Visby and Mariefred, Sweden, before arriving in Stockholm Aug. 19. The second leaves Stockholm Aug. 19, calling at Helsinki, Tallinn, St. Petersburg, Drottningholm and Visby, Sweden, and Bornholm and Christiansoe, Denmark, before arriving in Copenhagen Aug. 29.

Prices for the sailings are $9,200 per person, double occupancy, for Saturday’s departure, and $8,500 for the Aug. 19 sailing. Port charges are an additional $165 or $175, and passengers have the option of buying two round-trip business-class air fares for the price of one on these sailings.

In addition to the Pavlovsk Palace exclusive, our Baltic sailing aboard Sea Goddess I was also one of Cunard’s “epicurean delight” voyages that featured two evening menus created by chef Tom Colicchio of New York’s Cafe Mondrian, with complementary wines from winemaker Doug Shafer of the Napa Valley.

From the Baltic, Sea Goddess I will reposition to the Mediterranean and Greek Isles in September and early October. The Sept. 19 departure from Monte Carlo for an 11-day sailing to Istanbul is also an epicurean cruise that will feature chef Hubert Keller of San Francisco’s Fleur de Lys and winemakers Eileen Crane and Eric Murray of Domaine Carneros in Napa. Fares are $9,200 per person, double occupancy.

On the 10-day Oct. 10 sailing from Piraeus, Greece, to Barcelona, guest chef Kevin Graham of New Orleans’ Windsor Court Hotel will be cooking, while guest winemaker Robin Moody of Australia’s Penfolds Winery will conduct wine-tastings. Fares are $7,700 per person, double occupancy.

A 10-day cruise between Istanbul and Piraeus, Sept. 30 through Oct. 10, can be added onto either of the above sailings for an additional $3,900 per person.

Select champagnes, wines and all liquors aboard Sea Goddess I are included in the basic fare, as are tips and some shore excursions. Service remains among the best available at sea, friendly and efficient without needless hovering.

On-board accommodations are suite-like, with picture window, separate sitting area, king-size bed, TV and VCR, stocked bar, hair dryer, room safe and bath with tub and shower.

Since the Sea Goddess ships attract primarily upscale, sophisticated travelers, there is little in the way of on-board activities and entertainment except for a small casino and a quartet that plays for dancing before and after dinner.

The food aboard is excellent, with dishes cooked to order as in a fine restaurant. Passengers may arrive for dinner any time between 8 and 10 p.m. and sit where and with whom they please in the dining room. The sailings are fairly dressy, with a typical 10-day cruise calling for three formal nights, six jacket-and-tie nights and only one casual evening. On the formal nights on our cruises, every man aboard wore a tuxedo or dinner jacket.

The company’s ships have earned a reputation for “caviar and champagne,” as both are served generously whenever and wherever requested, from sunset on the top deck to midnight in the Jacuzzi. Full-course meals can be ordered in the cabins 24 hours a day, and the ship carries a large library of classic and recent film features.

For more information, see a travel agent or call Cunard at (800) 458-9000.