Collecting tickets at train stations

I have no experience using loco2.com, but I would expect that you can pick up all tickets at your first station, or even another station in France. If it only says that you need the booking code, and not necessarily the same credit card used for purchase, then that should be quite easy. If it does require a credit card, then it probably needs chip-and-PIN to work in the machines.

Many thanks for your speedy response, Laura. It would be great if I can indeed pick up all the tickets at my first station, to save anxiety on early morning starts later in the holiday. The card I'll be using for purchase is chip+PIN so no worries on that score.

We picked up tickets in France purchased from Captain Train, a similar reseller. All we needed was the code, no payment card required. I see loco2.com has online instructions on how to pick up tickets at the station. Take a look, see if it's the same.

From what Laura says, I would do best to delay booking the 2 intra-France trips until the final France-UK one is available and then try to book them all at once so they have the same booking code.

The 'collect at station' instructions for loco2.com tickets will apparently accompany the email confirming the booking, but I expect they will be essentially the same as for capitaine train bookings. I'm perhaps just a little to early trying to anticipate potential problems.

I would not delay on booking the two intra-France tickets. Ticket prices will be higher as you approach the travel date and tickets generally go on sale 90 days before the travel date with the cheapest tickets selling out first. If your itinerary is firm, you should consider buying early to get the best price. Often these tickets are non-exchangeable and non-refundable so they are a good idea if you are firmly committed to your plans. All you need is a code to pick up your tickets so I don't see the issue with having two different codes for two sets of tickets. By the way, why wait for this "combination" ticket. Just buy your ticket to Paris from whatever site you are using. I have never used loco2.com. I use sncf.com/en or captaintrain.com. And buy your Eurostar ticket from Eurostar.com. You are going to have to get across Paris to get to Gare du Nord and having a "combination" ticket is not going to avoid that. When are you traveling?

Eurostar tickets go on sale 6 months ahead of your travel date and get progressively more expensive the closer to your travel date you buy them. Go now to Eurostar.com and see what sort of prices you can get. Off hours and less crowded days midweek are often the best prices and you are probably too late to get the bargain prices. I don't know anything about loco2 but you can do it all yourself and print your tickets at home if you haven't already committed to loco.

Actually, I was thinking that even if you had more than one retrieval code, you could still just stand at the kiosk and retrieve each set of tickets.

Many thanks to everyone who responded. I did eventually find my way to the excellent loc2.com help page where detailed instructions with screen-shots are given for collecting pre-paid tickets at a French train station. I shall very likely do as Laura suggests: book each segment as soon as it becomes available (have set alerts to remind me) and then retrieve them all at the first station (if I have sufficient time on that occasion).