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We would like seats together - Barcelona to Paris.

My daughter will have a EurRail Pass and I will be doing point to point on TGV Barcelona to Paris. Is it possible to somehow get reserved seats together?

Posted by
19653 posts

Your daughter's Eurail Pass complicates things. Is she sure she actually needs one?
I just tried booking 2 seats from Barcelona to Paris to Paris for the 7:05 am departure. You could get a ticket with a seat reservation for 89 EUR. But your daughter being charged 89 EUR with a note "We cannot book Global Pass seat reservations for international trains on-line. You must visit an SNCF boutique to obtain a seat reservation."

People usually buy Eurail passes because they talk to travel agents, and Eurail Passes are a commissionable product. Travel agents don't make any money when you book your cheap train tickets on-line directly with the operator.

Posted by
23178 posts

Sam is correct. You could try booking your ticket and then seeing if they would change the seat reservation when your daughter picks up her reservation.

Posted by
4 posts

Thanks! She will be in Spain a month before I arrive, and will be traveling around with other friends. This train trip will be the only one I take. I thought it might be a problem. Sam, which site were you checking? Do they assign your seat or are you able to choose like when you book an airline seat?

Posted by
19653 posts

Here is where I looked. They operate the train.
https://en.oui.sncf/en/tgv

Now when I booked seats, it did not give me a seat diagram the way other country's railways do, like Deutsche Bahn or Trenitalia. They ask if you want the upper or lower deck, a window or aisle seat, then assign you a carriage number and seat number. If you bought 2 tickets, they'd be next to each other if you selected the same deck and one an aisle and one a window.

SNCF uses 3-D security with credit cards, and that makes it tricky for Americans. They also take Paypal.
You can also use the agent Loco2, which sells tickets without mark-up and has less stringent credit card vetting. https://loco2.com/en-us

Posted by
4 posts

Excellent. Thanks.

Wow. Never heard of 3D credit cards. Is this new? We haven't been to Europe since Fall 2017. Thieves are making things more complicated for us all!

Posted by
16893 posts
  • If you book both on this site, the regular ticket and the passholder reservation, then seats will be assigned by the computer and not necessarily together.
  • Your daughter can take care of the purchase for both of you at a train station or Renfe office near her in Spain.
  • Or you can do it by phone with a live agent at Rail Europe, but that service costs more and it's hard to actually get connected at this time of year.

Odd that this question is "suddenly" coming up twice in a row. Info for you is similar to https://community.ricksteves.com/travel-forum/spain/seat-reservations-on-renfe.

Posted by
4 posts

I never did read that post. The title didn't seem to be applicable. Anyway, thanks for all the help. Hopefully not every seat will be occupied and one of us can move.