We landed in Paris yesterday morning - walked right up to the counter for Passport Control - then on to Customs - nothing - no stops, no questions, I tried to declare the cat - but no one cared! We breezed right through!
After reading about the long lines at CDG I was a bit leary but we really lucked out!
Fantastic first couple of days in Paris.
That happened to us our last time through CDG, too. I'm always surprised to read all the bad reviews. Perhaps we were both just lucky.
Hi,
C'est formidable!
Normally, I expect to wait at Immigration regardless of the airport, FRA, London LHR or CDG, 20-30mins doesn't matter, but when it starts pushing one hour or beyond, then that's tedious.
The Europeans are a lot more relaxed about traveling animals. aren't they? Have a wonderful time, Christi. It's been a long time coming for you!
That's great! May the rest of your trip be just as smooth....
There are fewer tourists in August in Paris. That may explain something.
I entered Europe 17 times since 2005 14 of those thru CDG and never had much of a wait at Passport Control. On my first time I had barely got in line when an additional officer entered an empty booth and motioned me over. She held my passport just a few seconds and waved me on without bothering to stamp my passport (much to my chagrin when I thought about it later). My second trip was similarly a short wait. This officer also spent just moments with my passport and waved me on. This time I asked if he would stamp my passport. He had to reach way under his desk to get his stamp. None of my later entries took very much time either.
I always travel the end of March/early April and early December for Christmas and arrive around 9:00AM on the same American flight from Dallas. Whether that timing effects me or not, I don't know. I thought now with all the terrorist problems France has had lately their Passport Control would have tightened but from the comments above that doesn't appear true.
My experience leaving CDG is the process is longer and more involved with waiting in a longer line for an exit interview, getting your boarding pass, and then going thru Security check.
Christi, that is wonderful! Oh, yes...I've encountered lines for Immigration at CDG so you were really lucky!
@ Fred. An hour shuffling through to the agent in Brussels this past April. Staring at the same people round and round in the lineup for an hour. Seeing our checked bags going in circles on the belt through the plate glass window. Ugh. And, what really p****d us off was after about 55 minutes they opened up the back of the line for the most recent arrivals, sending them to the "EU Citizens" agents and they were gone before we even got to our guy. Ugh again.
There must be a better way.
I've been through CDG, coming and going, at least 16 times, and it's always been super easy every time...
Glad you're having a fantastic time in my favorite place!
@ Peter....My experience is if I arrive in the morning, ca 10 am to noon, then I can expect no more than waiting 20 mins, maybe at worse 30 mins or so to get up to the official to have the Passport stamped. I'm not in a hurry anyway since I don't connect to another flight. The one time I recall landing in the afternoon at LHR it took forever, so it seemed..taxing. There was a sign when I got to that part of the line that ran something like this: " From this spot on, you should be talking to a Border Official in 45 mins" . My immediate thought was "another 45 mins to go.?" Well, it turned out to be exact, ie by the time 45 mins was up, I had reached a Border Official...amazingly accurate. It 's best to schedule a flight when coming from the west coast your arrival will be prior to noon.
Arriving at Heathrow with kids is always a blessing as you usually get waved through to a family line which is always much faster than the standard line. Without kids I always opt for the e-passport booth.
Arriving at Nice two weeks ago it only took about 20 minutes to pass through immigration and that was with only two agents. A far cry from the hysterical media headlines about huge delays due to more thorough passport checks. The days of a casual glance at the cover of your passport have gone, they now scan each passport which but it only adds a few seconds so it really is no big deal.
"Without kids I always opt for the e-passport booth." - before anyone asks, this is only freely available to holders of EU/EEA passports. Anywhere else you'd need to be a "Registered Traveller" and this is only really viable for frequent travellers.
https://www.gov.uk/uk-border-control/at-border-control
and you don't want to know about bringing the cat.....
@Steve...learned all about bringing the cat. That is why we are taking a taxi from Calais to Folkestone!
Yes, Folkestone...my one time ( so far) crossing the Channel by ferry was from Folkestone to Boulogne in August 1987. The one ferry route I most definitely want to take is that from Portsmouth to St Malo.
We flew into CDG in Sept, 2015 - arrival was something like 9am or so - I thought we were in the wrong area when we got to passport and we had a whole 2 min wait - the barely controlled chaos was on the other end - the people who were flying OUT - that was insanity at the check in area (and only reinforced my plan to fly INTO CDG and home from Heathrow).
We had a short wait once at LHR - maybe 5 min, but generally it's 20-40 min. Had almost an hour wait once flying into Gatwick from Venice. Had a really short wait flying into Naples - other than we were the last ones in the queue (they deplaned on the tarmac/bussed to the terminal and my mom and hubby were soooooo slow getting off the bus) - they gave the passports a cursory glance and didn't even ask a question.
Christi, glad you had an easy arrival!! May that bode well for the rest of your trip.
Meanwhile, my boss missed his flight out of CDG this morning due to a 4-km backup on the roads leading to the airport due to a security alert over a bag someone left somewhere. You never know!
"we are taking a taxi from Calais to Folkestone!" - what!*$????? Have you actually got this booked and agreed? It will cost a fortune!!!
@Steve
Not putting my cat in the cargo hold of a plane - priceless.
But not crazy expensive. This taxi company saw a need and filled it. If you take a passenger ferry the animal would have to go in a kennel on the ship. The only way to keep your animal with you on the crossing by either tunnel or ferry is with a vehicle. Taking a rental one way is pretty spendy too plus you have the logistics of pick up & drop off. This way the taxi picks us up at the train station in Calais, we drive on le shuttle and spend the 38 minute crossing in the taxi on the train. They then drop us at the train station in Folkestone to continue on. Easy Peasy
