Paris to Barcelona in March

You really shouldn't spend your last night in Barcelona if you're flying home from Paris. What will it cost you to buy three last-minute one-way airline tickets home if that Barcelona-Paris flight is canceled or severely delayed and the return flight takes off without you? That's called an "unprotected connection", and you don't want one.

Your trip is short, so it's a shame to spend the time checking into a Parisian hotel twice. The usual recommendation in this sort of situation (round-trip ticket but a desire to see a second city as well) is to go immediately to the second city on the day of arrival. The tricky part is figuring out how much time to allow between the scheduled arrival of your transatlantic flight and the departure time of the hop to Barcelona. I have no guidance to offer on that subject, never having had the nerve to do what I'm suggesting to you.

Paris and Barcelona are an awkward combination. They're far enough apart that you save time by traveling to the airport, clearing security, flying, and traveling to the city center. But not much time and I chose to take the train and catch up on my journal, etc. However I was flying into one and out of the other (multi-city) and you need to make a round trip. If it were my family I'd call a meeting, bring maps or laptops, and lay out the problem.

Assuming Barcelona can't be swapped with someplace closer that has awesome food (I'm thinking Normandy, but that's just me) maybe nights 1 and 2 in Paris, fly to Barcelona, nights 3-6 there, fly back and spend nights 7-10 back in Paris. That doesn't give you much countryside, but Barcelona is on the Mediterranean Sea so that might be your best chance at providing something for everyone.

I want to second acraven and really encourage you not to book a same-day separate ticket for a flight back to Paris in order to catch your return flight back to North America. (I am assuming that the April 1 flight is indeed back to North America).

These kinds of intra-European short-haul flights are the first in line to get impacted, delayed or canceled, in any case of irregular operations such as bad weather, industrial action/strikes, etc. If your Barcelona-Paris flight is delayed or canceled, which causes you to miss your Paris-North America flight, you will be on the hook for paying the price of walk-up transatlantic same-day or next-day tickets, which won't be cheap.

If you still have the flexibility (is this is a 2020 trip or a 2021 trip?) I would head straight to Barcelona the day of arrival. I realize that would be a separate ticket as well, so there's a risk of missing that, but the cost of last-minute Paris-Barcelona air tickets is much smaller, so much less of a potential loss.

If that can't be helped, at the very least I would fly back (or take the train back) the day before to Paris, so on March 31.

For future refererence: It might not have cost much more to fly into Barcelona and home from Paris. That's called a "multi-city" ticket.

Thank you so much for the advice. Although I am now looking at starting a completely new itinerary I would rather stress about it now than when in Europe. What about this... we have 3 days in Paris booked, 22-24. What if we took high speed train to Barcelona Wednesday 25th, stayed in Barcelona 3 nights then took the Renfe SNCF train (makes several stops) back to Paris staying 1 night in Auvergne region and 2 nights in Burgandy region, taking train in from close by 4/1 for 3pm trans Atlantic flight???

What if we took high speed train to Barcelona Wednesday 25th, stayed
in Barcelona 3 nights then took the Renfe SNCF train (makes several
stops) back to Paris staying 1 night in Auvergne region and 2 nights
in Burgandy region, taking train in from close by 4/1 for 3pm trans
Atlantic flight???

Personally, I'd still prefer to be in Paris the night before a long-haul transatlantic flight -- i.e. somewhere from where there are multiple options to get to the airport in, say, less than 2 hours.

I have done the train-to-long-haul-flight thing due to trip planning that was out of my control -- the first TGV of the morning from Lyon to CDG to catch an 11:00 am flight out of CDG.

Then the night before my flight a surprise SNCF strike occurred -- I got lucky in that my train was only very mildly delayed, but I can tell you, the stress of wondering if I was going to make my flight was unpleasant. (Lyon to Paris is only 2 hours and change on the train but it's a 5 hour drive -- if I had found out that my train was canceled the morning of I would absolutely have missed my flight.)

Of course, the odds are strongly that a plan like this will go off without a hitch, but I think this is one place where it's worth it to be conservative in planning. If I were in your shoes I'd pick either the Auvergne or Burgundy to stay 2 nights, then stay the night in Paris before your flight.

My attitude is the same as Andrew's. I want to be within an affordable cab ride of the airport the night before my flight, just in case there's a breakdown in my planned public transportation.

Thanks so very much for all your help!

Sam Sebastian has a coastline and is also known to be a food lover paradise