Hotel Convenient to Paris-CDG for 4:50 PM (1650) EU Flight

Either stay in Paris and enjoy a pleasant dinner the night before and a nice stroll around the Cathedral and take the RER to the airport the next day to arrive 2 hours before your flight OR stay at the airport. There is no nice little town with good public transport to the airport nearer to the airport. You could stay in Senlis a charming little medieval town but if you do that arrange for a taxi to the airport the next day. My one visit there, the bus I was supposed to take back to Chantilly to get back to Paris simply didn't show up and we waited an hour for the next one -- there is no train. I would never want to be stuck at the airport for dinner with an afternoon flight the next day.

What is checkout time at that airport hotel? Seems like you will have some time on your hands at the airport.

Ibis-at-the-airport is our standard last night in Paris -- but that's because we get sunrise flights! Dinner at Mickey D's. In your case, however, I would go with a Paris hotel (yes, there are decent hotels near the price of the Ibis), dinner at someplace Parisian, walk along the Seine, walk around in the morning after breakfast, take the RER to the airport after commute hour.

Check-out time at the Ibis is noon, so not too bad.

I really don't want the hassle of going into Paris with a suitcase, possibly dragging it up several flights of stairs, paying the price for an air-conditioned hotel, etc. If I end up being rather close to Paris the morning of July 4, maybe I can get to the CDG hotel before lunchtime, dump my bag, and head into the city for the day. But I may not be all that close, and at that point of the trip I may be OK with some downtime in an airport hotel. This will be Day 87.

I've been trying to fit Paris into a trip since 2017, but it hasn't worked out yet. I'm hoping it will happen next year. I'll plan on at least ten days there, maybe more, so I'm not frantic to squeeze in a few hours of sightseeing in the city this time.

Thanks for the confirmation that there isn't really a good option other than Paris itself or the airport.

A chacon, but from my point of view for a 4:50 flight a convenient hotel can be found in Lyon, Avignon, Reims, Dijon, Strasbourg, or Bordeaux.

Like to live dangerously, do we?

Acraven — out of curiosity, where are you arriving from, and via what means of transport?

I can see what you mean about Day 87 maybe being perfectly happy with a down day at the hotel !!

I don’t think the prior poster likes to live dangerously — the places they mention are all easily accessible to CDG for such a late afternoon flight within Europe (I.e. not the same risk level price wise as a trans-Atlantic flight). It would be perfectly reasonable for someone from one of these areas to get to Paris the day of the flight. You’re not comfortable with that, and that’s fine too. You have determined your level of risk tolerance, and that’s the one that matters in this scenario.

I'll be traveling northward through western France by train and bus, but I don't know when I'll cross the border from Spain, much less how many days I'll decide to spend in Pau, the Basque Country, Bordeaux, etc. Thus I'm not sure how far north I will have gotten by the time I need to high-tail it to CDG for the flight to Scotland. The original thought was to travel all the way to Brittany and have some time in Paris, but even Brittany feels rather unlikely at this point.

I am very risk-averse when I have an appointment with an airplane. I know the TGV would whisk me rapidly from Bordeaux to Paris, but at this point I'm hoping to have progressed farther north than that. If I end up having to buy a TGV ticket from Bordeaux late in the game, it will be very costly, and I will feel doubly silly because I'm nearly certain there are flights from Bordeaux to Edinburgh. I'm hoping to be a lot closer to Paris than that so that a late-purchased train ticket will not be so expensive.

I'm also keeping in mind the possibility of a rail strike that would complicate a last-day trip to the airport if I had a lot of ground to cover. I am not willing to pay a taxi to get me from a distant city to CDG. Not thrilled about spending all day on a bus, either.

I try to avoid mid-trip flights because they lead to situations like this when you don't have a solid itinerary pinned down before you need to buy the airline ticket, but I didn't have a practical alternative this time, because I wanted to get into and out of Scotland before the August festivals drove up the hotel rates in Edinburgh.

Thanks for all the suggestions.

I definitely understand about getting to Edinburgh before the festivals!

I don't know if I had realized about the Spain/SW France part of your trip. It's going to be fascinating!

I'm sure it will. I loved northern and central Spain in 2016 and eastern France in 2017. Now I need to do the other half, as it were. Too bad Paris keeps getting cut, but I know it's easy to fly straight there, so I don't want to skip right past places in harder-to-reach locations when this may be (for example) my only trip through the French Basque Country.

I never never stayed at an airport hotel, and certainly wouldn't do so with a late afternoon flight. I would choose either Paris itself, or Senlis.

Robert, I've read comments to the effect that Senlis isn't really a safe choice if you don't have a car. That's the sort of place I was hoping to uncover with this thread--but one with good bus or rail service to CDG.

acraven, I can't speak to the bus service from Senlis, since I've always had a car there and driven to CDG. I know that one commenter has mentioned that she waited for a bus in Senlis that never came. But was that just a one-time fluke? I've never checked the bus schedule and route from Senlis to CDG, but maybe it's not great. W/o a car, I'd probably stay in Paris the night before.

This thread isn't the first time Senlis-but-with-a-car has come up, but of course I don't know how many different people have expressed that opinion.

Having once eaten a night's hotel cost in Girona, Spain, when a bus just didn't show up, I am gun-shy. Financially that earlier fiasco cost me only about 45 euros for a replacement hotel room. That pales next to the cost of a last-minute ticket from Paris to Edinburgh (with checked-bag fee)plus possibly an additional hotel room for the night.

I know it seems strange not to seize the opportunity to spend even one night in Paris, but one night in a place that needs at least ten would frustrate me. I'm a patient person and can wait a year or two until I can spend an appropriate amount of time in the city.

Well Senlis would be a choice if you gave yourself a whole lot of time to get to that flight -- you could have the afternoon evening there and then start for the airport by bus very early so that plan B could be in effect -- or just book a taxi to the airport. It is a lovely little town.

Iible town I should look into--or a suburb of Paris hs there a transit-accesseading in the direction of CDG?

Yes, Janet suggested Senlis and I'll add Chantilly. But both use local buses and/or trains. Some, Beauvais and Compiegne, require you to ride into Gare du Nord to catch the RER back to the airport. How does that feel to you?

One of the drawbacks of your being such an experienced traveler is that you've had so many different situations, including that bad experience, which makes you cautious when you have a flight to catch. I'm like you the more experiences I pile up. So, the answer is probably "no" unless a transit option feels comfortable.

I'm sure you'll make good use of your time at CDG: sometimes simplifying, staying in and reading a good book or working on trip notes makes the most sense.

FWIW, I've stayed at the CDG Ibis and it was fine. This was before a morning flight, and I don't know what I would have done all day at the airport before a late afternoon flight like yours, but if it was Day 87 I probably would welcome the down time.

The Ibis restaurant is serviceable but nothing to write home about. There may be better dining options, with prices to match, at some of the higher-end airport hotels, but I wouldn't count on any airport place for a memorable (in the good sense) last-night-in-France dinner. But, from your posts, my sense is that high-end dining isn't one of your priorties (nor is it mine).

Let me just add, as a longtime acraven admirer, that it's time to plan a trip centered on Paris. Some people go only there and think they've been to "Europe," you don't have to worry about that. So work it into your future plans, OK? Then you'll be able to stay there the night before your afternoon flight and not have to deal with those airport hotels. (But they're still a good idea before a morning flight, I think.)

I have comprehensive notes about Paris I compiled back in 2017 and then typed up last winter to share with friends making a trip to the city in March 2018, so I am more than ready to go. I have a long list of budget-priced (but air-conditioned!) hotels in Paris, gathered from this very forum, all prepared. I just need the time to settle in for a nice, long visit.

I'm thinking next year might be the year I spend some time going to the places I had to cut out of my recent trips: Paris, Brittany (assuming I don't get there this year), Mallorca, some smaller towns in Czechia (plus a few more days in Prague), Slovakia... How's that for variety?

Yes, the more I think about it, the more I'm at peace with spending a night at CDG. I'll try to accomplish something, sightseeing-wise, before I get there. I can stand a meal or two of airport food in the middle of a long trip. I do like good food, but more what a local middle-class person might eat, not fancy/expensive stuff. I find that on a long trip, I don't feel I need a really special meal every day. I do try to eat healthy food, though, meaning lots of veggies. I missed a paid-for bus tour 2 years ago after a dinner of deep-fried bar snacks (the only thing available in the hotel restaurant--thank you, Ibis). That will never happen again!

Well, you can probably find deep fried bar snacks at the CDG Ibis, but also more nutritious foods, even veggies I suppose! ;-)

I intend never to eat at an Ibis again.