Car rental IN Paris?

It's crazy to bring up the idea in public. Now you'll get beat to hell by the pay-for-trains-and-cars-on-the-same-day crowd.

The escape from Montparnasse isn't the easiest, but it's not horrible. Getting the car back there could be a bunch of grins. Nord is the easiest and probably has the largest number of choices, but it's a few extra miles on the beltway.

What I'd do is rent as close as possible to where I was staying or the place with the fewest metro changes to get there.

Congrats on showing a lick of sense.

I know we talked about this yesterday and we plan to do something similar. When we arrive via Eurostar at Gare du Nord we will pick up a car and head for Normandy. No sense in traveling from one train station to another, then training to another location to pick up a car. Getting a car when we first arrive makes the most sense both financially and time-wise. Montparnasse is the closest train station to where you are staying, and with your GPS it shouldn't be hard to get out of town.

Well, the good thing is that we won't return the car back in Paris. We will return it in Strasbourg, so at least that will make it easier!

The Auto Europe site shows a pickup point at Porte d'Orleans which is south of Gare Montparnasse and close by the Peripherique ring road. I'll defer to Ed on whether it would be easier to get out of the city from there rather than from Gare Montparnasse. Take Metro line 4 to Porte d'Orleans.

Yes, Porte d' Orleans is easier. It's a small agency in a hotel lobby that is a small branch of the Montparnass agency. You may have to wait while they pick the car up for you at Montparnass. That said, the drive from Montparnass to the ring road is not a big deal, just some traffic jams around Alesia but you get there eventually. We often go down to Orly to pick up cars if we're heading south, but that can cost as much as your train ticket. Ed makes a good point about picking up the car close to your hotel.

Just as a reference point, my dad will pay ANY train ticket to avoid even being a passenger driving in or out of Paris. And if you're driving all the way to Strasbourg after the Loire, you might be doing yourself a great disservice as it takes so much longer to drive there than to take the TGV.

Don't forget the cost of fuel and tolls (and your sanity) to get from Paris to the Loire, either. They are not zero, and may well be equal to 15-30€. I'm not sure there are even any savings there (would analyze to be sure).