Trains for Dummies

chiming in because I too am interested in what to do....only we are travelling by train for one day from paris to Strasbourg & then possibly from Strasbourg to Stuttgart....so hoping for answers with you :)

I can answer "the kingsmountain" question because I just did the same route in reverse. Just pick up your tickets at the train station. There's no advantage to riding 1st class. 2nd class is good.

If you get a France Saverpass for 3 days of travel, you will pay extra for seat reservations and we recommend making them at the same time that you buy the pass, since the number of places for passholders is limited. The 1st-class pass currently costs $222 per person when you purchase before about noon on April 30. Seat reservations cost about $12 each to add to your order. Reservations are typically available starting 3 months in advance of the travel dates, as are point-to-point tickets with advance purchase discounts. If your trip is a few months away, either option could be a good value.

Kingsmountain's route is different, shorter, so the answer is not the same. Just buy tickets instead of a 3-day railpass, but do book in advance (see link above) if you are committed to dates and times and want to cut the price.

You don't say when you are going or if those are your only 3 train trips, but if you know your dates of travel and are able to purchase 90 days out, you can do those three train trips for approx €108 ($150) and those tickets include the reservations. If you're going to be doing other train trips or you don't have set dates to travel on and want to be more flexible, the pass may work for you.

Compare the point-to-point prices on the French rail site to what the pass would cost and then you can make a decision. The limited number of seats for passholders is a deal-breaker for me when planning.

We are only two months out from our travel dates. We will only be traveling by train for these three trips. Do you think there will be a great disparity in the prices for buying in advance as opposed to buying as needed? Will we have a better chance of getting seats without making reservations as some have noted that there are only a certain number of seats for passes? (I titled this TRAINS for DUMMIES on purpose! ;) )

The only way to know if there are discounts at this date for your times is to look at the scheduled offerings and see; often the cheap seats sell out early but sometimes there are cheaper seats still available 60 days out. You definitely pay top prices if you wait till close to time of travel and passes rarely save money but always add the aggravation of not being able to get seats if the pass slots are taken.

Go to this website: http://en.voyages-sncf.com/en/ and enter Paris (Roissy Charles de Gaulle airport) as the from station and Avignon as the to station. Enter the date you want to travel and the ages of those in your party and select Great Britain (any country except US) as the ticket collection country. You can then see what is available for trains and ticket prices - the prices shown will be for all persons in the party and sometimes there are small group rates that apply depending on the time of the train.

Then do the same for Avignon to Colmar and Colmar to Paris. Add up the costs and see if it's less than the $222/person pass rate (and don't forget the per/person reservation costs for each train, especially if you want to sit together).

It's a bit of work but it's the only way you can tell which is the better option (pass or p to p). Point to point will almost always be the better deal if you can commit to the date and time of train.

Thank you so much for all of the information. I have been successful choosing which trains to use for each of the three legs of travel. I have typed all information for each of the five of us who need a ticket....which was at marathon speed as not to get timed out.....only to have my credit card rejected THREE different times. I even called the cc issuer to let them know I would be using it on the voyages-scnf website! Any suggestions there? It seems I have read where others had the same dilemma, but I cannot recall where. Thanks again.

I'm not sure why some people have that problem, I've never had a problem with my cc - I did let them know I would be purchasing from a foreign website before I attempted to purchase, not sure if that makes a difference.

I think if you tried and failed 3 times it may have 'locked' you out and you need to wait 24 hours before trying again.

Otherwise, hopefully someone else will have better information.

Thank you, Nancy. We have finally been able to book our train tickets. I had been 'clicking' the e-ticket option all three times. Apparently, the website did not like that choice. My sister (using the same info. and cc) clicked on the 'pick up at the train station' and it went right through! That must have been the issue. Thanks again, everyone, for the help. Perhaps our experience will benefit someone else.

If you have to pick up the tickets at the train station, please be sure to bring along the credit card that was used to make the purchase. That is mission critical if you hope to actually get the tickets that you paid for when you get to the station. Also, In the future, if you have problems with the sncf website, try www.capitainetrain.com.

It's pretty much agreed, on this forum and others, that if you pay attention to www.seat61.com for train questions anywhere, you will end up a lot smarter than when you started.

Someone mentioned that you should choose any country except the US (they suggested the UK) what is the reason for that? And if I am doing just the paris to strasbourg run is it best to print them out at home or have them set to pick up at the train station as well? What is the difference? (Still a bit of a dummy here ;0)

"Someone mentioned that you should choose any country except the US (they suggested the UK) what is the reason for that?"

People say that because the SNCF website used to automatically switch you to Rail Europe when you input USA. The Rail Europe site did not show all trains available and often had higher prices. Now it appears that they give you a pop-up window with an option to stay on the SNCF website or be switched to Rail Europe. So I guess it's not so important anymore, you can just choose to stay on the original website.

Edit: Also, the option to print at home vs. pick up at station usually depends on the train you choose. Tickets for some train segments cannot be printed at home.