Best site to book train tickets to Paris

Buy your train tickets at www.sbb.ch

Hi Romy,
I don’t know of a pass that would be cheaper than point to point tickets that involve a border crossing. You can buy tickets here: https://www.sbb.ch/en/timetable.html.

Hi Romy, in order to answer your question about local transit in Paris (I think thst's what you mean ), can you lease let us know what days of the week you'll be in Paris ? unfortunately Paris doesn't have a 168-hour pass, they have a week pass, but it starts on Mondays and is valid through Sunday, so say your time in Paris is Thursday to Thursday, you would need two weekly passes to bridge the gap.

Did you ask that guy in seat 61?

Trainline is a helpful alternative to official train sales. In recent years it has been easier to navigate than the SNCF site The sales commission is small. https://www.thetrainline.com/en-us

SNCF's site is hardly a model of user friendliness, but SBB's is very easy to use.

In Paris, you can use the RATP site, or app "Bonjour RATP". You can buy a Navigo Decouverte pass for 30 EUR + 5 EUR for the card that gets you unlimited travel on buses, RER trains, and the Metro. The weekly pass runs from Monday-Sunday. If you search the forum, you will find more information on buying that pass.

I think that the latest version: sncf-connect.com is fast and very easy to use. Also good: trainline.com, but they do have a small upcharge. For international trains, you can use almost any search engine such as https://www.kayak.com/trains. The national rail companies commit to seats on one another´s trains so the SNCF may not show all possible seats on a train from Paris to Zurich. You can potentially save money by using a global search engine.

Paris offers a variety of pass/ticket options for the visitor, but as Kim notes, you must specify the days of the week you are in Paris and where you want to go (if you are traveling outside Paris such as to Versailles or Disney).

The SNCF Connect site is easy to use nowadays. I use it about once a month.

TRAINLINE Just returned from Best of Paris (12-18 Feb '23) with extra days pre and post.

I used Trainline for Gare Montparnasse round trip to/from Chartres; Gare de L'Est to Reims; Gare Reims Ville to Champagne and connection to CDG (just yesterday). Efficient, good prices, good app with plenty of automatic reminders. ab

Paris by Train, https://parisbytrain.com, is a good source of information for traveling within Paris.

Enjoy your trip.

Thank you very much all. We will be reaching paris on Aug 28th which is a Monday and leaving Sep 4th will the Navigo Decouverte
weekly pass be the right option for us. We plan to use the metro every day. Also I noticed there is a photo on the pass, how do we upload photo on the this pass ?

We will be staying close to Varenne Metro station would appreciate recommendations on any good Restaurants and Boulangeries in
near 6th and 7th.

Thank you !

Yes, the Navigo Decouverte will work well if you are arriving on a Monday and leaving on a Monday so you'll have all 7 days worth of transit.

You don't need to upload photo but you need to bring one with you. I just photocopied my passport photo page and then trimmed down the picture to meet the guidelines. IF you forget, your hotel can photocopy your passport page for you and likely will lend you scissors, lol. Just bring the pictures (do not have to be on good paper or photo paper) maybe in a small ziplock bag and you can use them when you assemble the pass. I go to a Metro Station with a manned window OR to a Tabac near my hotel to do this transaction. I do not know if Varenne has a manned window as that's not my usual station, lol.

There are many restaurants within walking distance of the Varenne Metro.

Do you have an interest in WWII? There is a cafe on the other side of Les Invalides on Avenue de la Motte-Picquet that has a connection to the French Resistance. I've not eaten there as I'm vegan and the menu looks pretty "meaty", lol but it sounds so cool!! It's Cafe Max and it's location between Les Invalides and Ecole Militaire (the military school where Napoleon went) where German officers were stationed made it perfect for snooping.

https://www.sortiraparis.com/en/where-to-eat-in-paris/restaurant/articles/282172-chef-frederic-vardon-takes-over-cafe-max-high-place-of-the-french-resistance

https://www.cafemax.fr/en

for pass photos, every train station I saw had multiple photo booths (very old school). some Metro stations had them too.

A detail in reference to your using the weekly Navigo pass with the Navigo Découverte card. The Pass is valid for 7 days from Monday to Sunday. The pass will not be valid the Monday you leave. If you are simply going to the airport, you may not need to use public transportation that day anyway, particularly if you take a taxi to the airport.

For my mother and I. I used my iPhone and took a head shot of us, sent it to my MacBook, sized them down acordingly and printed a few color prints for us each and stuck them in my passport holder. At the train station in CDG, after getting the Navigo-D cards, I just put the kits together on a bench while waiting for our train. If you have photo paper, use that instead of regular printer paper.

Enjoy your trip.

Thank you all for recommendations on the pass looks like Navigo decouverte weekly pass would be the best option since we reach Paris on Monday and will be there for a week. Here's what we would like to do for a week,
Eiffel Tower, Luxembourg Gardens, Louvre Museum, Siene lunch/Dinner Cruise, Galeries LaFayette, Arc De Triomphe. Would like to know if we need to change anything or add more things to see, we will be visiting for 7 nights. My wife's birthday will be on a Saturday and would like to go for a nice dinner, any recommendations on good places with some Veg options and a nice view.

Thank You,

Romy