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CDG arrivals and baggage claim; any recent experience?

Bonjour!

I hope every one is well.

With recent reports coming out from Heathrow, Schiphol, and even Toronto-Pearson airports of extreme waits for clearing immigration/customs as well as baggage claim I was wondering has anyone experienced CDG recently and how it is holding up. I am trying not to check any baggage, following RS' advice, however my wife did not grow up with Rick and will have liquids bottles over 100 ml so I am trying get enough data to tell we can't check her bag. Our flight is supposed to arrive in CDG from Toronto at 0845 into terminal 2A and our train to Bayeux leaves at 1259; we will take a taxi to Gare St-Lazare.

Any information would be appreciated and thank you in advance.

Posted by
9459 posts

I arrived into CDG on June 4.

My notes say that i made it to baggage claim by 6:22 (I.e. by that time i had already gone through immigration), and my bag arrived on the belt at 6:37. So, I had a 15-minute wait.

Posted by
2537 posts

Typically, the long waits at CDG have been with passport control, not baggage claim.

Posted by
7977 posts

CDG has very slow baggage delivery and that is where we spend our time waiting -- last visit in April it was over half an hour even after clearing immigration which was actually pretty quick although it can be slow. They unloaded two planes that arrived at the same time onto the same baggage carousel and it was crowded chaos. Our plane load came out last.

With the whole process though we were in the cab line in about 70 minutes from landing.

Posted by
79 posts

We walked almost straight through passport control on 6/8. Ours was the only plane going through the line at that time and it was between 5-10 minutes to clear the line. I think one of our bags was already on the belt when we walked up. We had to wait a couple of minutes for all the bags to come out, but it was pretty painless.

The only bad CDG experience I had was passport control getting out of the country. The lines were incredibly long and they all closed up in unison as we neared the front of the line. No one ever explained what happened, but we assumed that the security area was backed up and they wanted to thin it out. But they never stopped letting EU citizens and priority travelers through passport control, so it took a long time for the bottle neck to clear and for them to start the line back up.

Posted by
80 posts

CDG baggage delivery is normally quick. It's often on the carousel when you get to the baggage area or 5-10 minutes later.
When there is slow baggage delivery it's mainly on non-Skyteam flights that use Air France baggage handlers. I waited 50 minutes a week ago but that's not normal, it's usually quick. It's the longest I've ever waited at CDG and I fly in and out every few weeks.

Posted by
7977 posts

my favorite is the tendency of CDG handlers to occasionally obviously deliberately to. unload priority baggage last. The last rare time we traveled business class ALL the priority bags came out well after everyone else's bags -- we waited bout 40 minutes for baggage (having zipped through immigration). I have to assume this is a giant F U to those riding in the front of the plane.

Posted by
500 posts

Our May flight, direct from Vancouver to CDG with Air France. Passport control was at least an hour as we arrived with other large North American flights at the same time (0815 hours). Luggage was not at the carousel for some time. Total time from deplaning to taxi was 2.5 hours.

Posted by
10116 posts

How many times has this happened to you, Janet? Maybe it was the crew at your originating city who loaded it all first deep into the hold. Additionally, someone above wrote that non-Air France planes have to wait for a crew to be freed up. If I remember, you don't take AF, so your luggage could take longer.

I regularly fly business into CDG but always on Air France and the luggage arrives right away. I wouldn't assume malfeasance. I'd just switch to AF because they do fly direct from where you live.

Posted by
69 posts

I arrived at CDG last Tuesday the 14th at 8:15AM terminal 2E? on a delta flight. Passport control was 15-20 minutes, my bag was on the conveyor a few mins after walking there. Walked to the train station area to get my NAVIGO weekly pass, 30 min later found the Roissy bus stop. Waited awhile then got on the bus at 10:15, arrived at Paris Opera 11:30. Walked to Gare St. Lazare, got off track briefly but arrived just before noon. Took the same 12:59 train to Bayeux, (listed as Cherbourg train) which left on track 17. Look at the monitors 10min before your departure time to see which track your train leaves from that day. If I had to do it over again, the taxi or RER trains would be my choice. The Roissy bus A/C was kaput and there was no other ventilation, 75 minutes in a rolling sauna, stuck in bumper to bumper Paris traffic. Walking to St. Lazare pulling my suitcase while jetlagged on a warm day through the chaotic busy streets of Paris was no dance party.

Posted by
23 posts

Thank you for the updates and advice, everyone! I will still try to get my wife not to check her bag but will watch how the AC flights are operating the week before to see if delays are normal.

Posted by
7977 posts

Bets we hate AF after several unpleasant flights but perhaps we should re-consider. Worst service in the air in our experience. They also don't have direct flights from Chicago.

Posted by
43 posts

Had 3 parties arrive in CDG on different days in May 2022. 5 min, 15 min, and 45 min of hell with a cranky jet lagged 6yo. Just bad luck.

Posted by
343 posts

You might want to check out the arrivals list on the airport website. You will be able to see how many large capacity International flights are arriving before or at the same time as yours on a given day of the week. Imagine all of those non-EU passengers in the "Non- Schengen" passport control line, not to mention baggage claim. Just did that research for my upcoming flight to Brussels, and my flight is the last of several international wide-body flights arriving within a 20 minute time span. I think I may want to pack a lunch!

Posted by
22 posts

We just got back from Paris June 22. Our flight TO Paris was June 7 arrival at about 10:45 am. They unloaded our plane on the tarmac instead of the terminal for some reason to do with I don't know what, so it brought us in on a ground flood level. In past flights to Paris we arrived on the 2d level.
On this level there was a passport and baggage claim I had not been to before. There was no other flight ahead of us so there was no waiting at all at immigration/passport, and our bags then came out within 10 minutes. Very fast!

On previous trips arriving on the 2d level, I would say immigration was about 10 minutes at most, and bags came out almost immediately upon getting to the baggage claim after taking that shuttle over to the area you have to take at CDG.

Leaving France at CDG was also very fast at immigration as well. In fact all our flights were on time and there were no delays of note although, when we got to CDG for our return-home flight, at 6am, terminal 2A had no power and they had to send all the passengers from that terminal over to 2D, which was rather a long walk. Then they set up those windows and started checking people in. All the work on the airline app to check in was seemingly pointless as they took everyone as if they were not checked in as far as I could tell, and yet, we made our flight no problems and it took off on time 3 hours later so it all worked out.

Posted by
5 posts

Arrived in Paris 6/13. Luggage was very fast. Airport very busy but we thought we got out pretty quickly. We did take taxi for 4 with carryon luggage and large backpacks each. If you had big luggage 4 wouldn’t fit. We were accosted by the unlicensed cabs. Make sure you go to taxi stand. 53 euro fixed price to right bank. TRAFFIC at 14:00. Over an hour. Later we learned metro. It is the only way to get around Paris quickly. And bullet train outside Paris is amazing.