Hi All-
I will be in Provence in September, needing to get to CDG airport for flight home on the 30th. Plane leaves Paris 2pm on the 30th. I am trying to decide where to drop off rental car . We are picking up rental car in Angers - and it looks like it may be best bet to drop it off there on the 29th. (Looking at TGV timetable from Avignon, I don't think we can count on leaving Avignon in the morning and getting to airport in time for flight in the afternoon-it is a Sunday and there won't be any room for error/delay) Now I am trying to find out if getting from Angers to CDG by 11am (flight leaves 2pm) will work.
I also looked at dropping car in Clermont Ferrard on 29th and training into Paris from there (since it is closer to Avignon) but the time involved in transit from Clermont was also too long to assure arrival at airport in time.
Bottom line is I am trying (maybe too hard) to avoid having to stay in Paris overnight-since I have no familiarity with the city, where to stay, etc.
thanks!
You could stay in Senlis the night before then drop the car off at CDG the next morning. I've done that several times. It's about a 20-25 minute drive to the airport, and Senlis is worth seeing.
Why don't you drop the car at the Avignon TGV station on Saturday night and take a TGV directly to CDG. You can book a room at an airport hotel. Then you won't have to deal with Paris but you'll be within a safe distance to catch your flight.
All the other driving around to be closer to Paris doesn't make it easier. For example, Clermont doesn't have a TGV, only an inter-city train, so it's not faster.
I'm confused too - Angers and Avignon are in two very different parts of the country.
I'd be more comfortable training in the evening before and staying at a hotel by the airport (or one in town with easy connections to CDG), especially for an expensive flight - but I'm very risk averse. We've been delayed hours a few times down south - once from Paris to Avignon where the train arrived almost 3 hrs late because someone committed suicide on the tracks and all trains were slowed. Another time from Nice to Avignon when there was a huge thunder/rain storm and our train was delayed about 90 min. I mean, maybe we just had bad luck, but we've only been to the south of France 3 times, and two of those times we hit train issues.