train options Bayeux (or somewhere else) to Paris

Caen or Rouen may have more direct trains to Paris. They are fairly large cities and may be good places to return your rental car.

We returned our rental car in Rouen and took the train to Paris. Odd thing happened: our rental car agency counter (Avis) was closed when we arrived. We had plenty of time so it wasn't a concern. An hour later, the Avis counter was still closed. We handed the keys over to someone in another rental agency (maybe Sixt?) and they took care of it! Everything worked out fine.

We turned our car in in Caen and went directly to Paris by train, no problem.

This is interesting. DB Bahn schedule is showing the regular direct trains from Bayeux to Paris St Lazare, roughly 1 every 2-3 hours, takes 2 hours, direct, non-stop (some stop in Caen only). But the French schedules are not showing these.
One of two things is happening:

Either the French schedule is not up that far out yet, maybe in a couple days it will be, as my trial shows June27 as the last selectable date.

Or, they have once again scheduled track work on the main Bayeux-Paris tracks and have taken that train down for a period of a few weeks, and this is not yet reflected ion DB Bahn's listings.

We ran afoul of this last year, the train from Paris TO Bayeux that we needed went offline, although the return train at the end of that week was running. This disappeared from the schedules even before 90 days out. We did a bit of scrambling, having to rearrange lodging and an Overlord Tour, and then took the alternative (which we could not have done on our arrival date). And much to our surprise, roughly 75 days out the track work was cancelled and the direct trains were back, and still available at the lowest advance rate. Unfortunately, we were already rebooked, including a different train option.

If you can stand it, I'd recommend waiting 2-3 weeks and seeing if this changes and the direct train returns.

Larry - Thank you for this information! A week or so ago, I checked the train schedules for the prior week to weigh the options, and all those non-stops were still there. I think I will wait and continue to check. Worst case we have to drive back to Paris but that would still be faster than all the transfers. I have plenty of time to firm up the details of the rental car since we're picking up at CDG. Presumably they won't sell out there. :)

Thanks all for your responses.

Celeste

Looking at the SNCF website, there are direct Intercites trains at 06:43, 08:35 and 11:35.
none is available yet for booking

http://en.voyages-sncf.com/en/train-ticket/result?hid=HBC

My calculations are June 27 is 90 days from today. I would watch these and see if they go on sale soon.

I just looked at the options and all that is available have 2 or 3 transfers.

were you looking on the Rail Europe site, by chance?

Bill,

Yes!

^^^

many people here recommend avoiding Rail Europe. They don't show all trains even when you're within the 90-day window, and they mark up their tickets. My guess, though, is that you're date is just a few days too far out for sncf to show the direct route.

I use Captain Train; no markup, take US credit cards, they show all the trains that sncf would show since they check the sncf reservations system.

Celeste, go to www.seat61.com for all you'll need to know about trains throughout Europe, when and where to buy and what to avoid. Most stay away from RailEurope. Check out www.captaintrain.com as it is the best place to purchase French train tickets.

Thanks to everyone for the info!! Haven't found a direct yet but I'll look over the next few days and hopefully they'll show up.

Just keep checking and they will probably show up. I had the same problem in fall 2014. Someone said they were probably still dealing with finalizing the schedule and all of the usual trains did finally show up. I ended up buying tickets on 8-29 for a train on Oct 11 and return on Oct. 15. Only a few awkward routings were showing up before that.

Just in case anyone else lands here with the same question, I found this info on Man in Seat 61 site. Likely the timetable changes are what is holding me up, since my date is just after the second Saturday in June. Thanks again for everyone who provided such good info to help relieve my stress. :)

Why can't I see any trains, even within the 180/120/90/60 days?

The June & December timetable changes: European train timetables change at midnight on the 2nd Saturday in June & 2nd Saturday in December, which dramatically shortens the booking horizon, as they're always late loading the new data. You'll often see no trains at all in the search results (or only odd ones) for dates after the timetable change, even well within the 90-92 days. Based on past years, French & German train bookings for dates after the December timetable change will open around 15-18 October, and Spanish, Italian & Eastern European trains may not open for booking until early to mid-November. More information about when bookings open. I usually post updates each year on the news page.

It could be engineering work: Unfortunately, the European infrastructure operators do not always plan their engineering work in sufficient time to maintain the 90 days booking period. This is a particular problem in France. You'll sometimes see trains 'missing' from the search results even within the 90 day booking period. Usually this simply means they haven't finalised the timetable, so haven't loaded the data - generally, if you sit tight and keep checking every day or two, the missing trains should appear in due course. Although very occasionally times are altered, or even a whole train cancelled on a specific date. Annoyingly, there's often no easy way to tell if a train is absent from the data because it's been cancelled on that date, or is simply not loaded yet and will appear shortly.

Just wanted to update in case anyone else looks. The direct trains were back today and I was able to book our train from Bayeux to Paris for 26 euros each (refundable). Thanks again to everyone who chimed in to help!

What site did you book tickets on? SNCF or captain train?

Captain Train. I tried booking direct with SNCF but there was some technical problem and the page wouldn't advance. Price was same on both sites, and refundable.