Eurostar To Paris - What Time?

Jennifer - 2 hrs to get through customs and baggage claim. This time may very depending on how many flights arrive at the same time as your flight. Are you carrying on? It is also about an hour tube ride to St. Pancras station. I've also read articles that getting through customs has increased at Heathrow. I guess what I'm trying to say is I'd opt for the 1:55 Eurostar to Paris .

Take the later train. You won't feel as stressed and if you have spare time you can take your bags to "left luggage" and walk to the nearby British Library and check out the "treasures" room which has everything from original Shakespeare scripts to original copies of Beatles songs.

Thanks! I was thinking the later train as well. Is buying online a good option?

Jennifer, you will need to buy in advance online unless you want to pay a lot for the ticket. The website is eurostar.com. Ticket prices increase as you get closer to the day of departure. Keep in mind the cheapest tickets are non-refundable so you don't want to cut it too close.

Any particular reason to take Eurostar rather than just flying to Paris since you are already at the airport?

Because I hadn't even thought of flying! It would be more expensive (about $120), but I'll have to see if hubby thinks it would be better. There is something about a journey by train, however, the logistics and time it takes to get to the Eurostar station may outweight the cost factor. I've heard horror stories about CDG though..

If you take the Eurostar, definitely book the 13:55 train. You must allow up to an hour to clear immigration/passport control at Heathrow and another hour to take the Piccadilly Line to King's Cross/St Pancras. You will go through security and passport control at St Pancras International and there is a 30-minute minimum check-in deadline. As much as I love trains, including the Eurostar, I suggest that you book the 12:35 British Airways flight from Heathrow to Orly.

If you do decide to to use Eurostar there is no reason to wait to book your tickets unless you can't commit. You will pay more for your tickets the later you wait, full price on the day. Worse is that many Eurostars are now going fully sold out so you certainly can't just rock up and hope to get on.

If connecting to Paris you will not need to do any customs clearance and immigration at Heathrow - providing you can get your bags interlined. Would have been easier if you had booked the connecting flight to Paris with your original ticket, but I guess that option has gone already. Probably still possible if arriving on a Oneworld airline (AF still charges silly prices for one ways).

When we originally booked the airfare, we weren't thinking about going to Paris right away but then realized we didn't want to be in London for the Olympics. I've found a good RT flight price through Air France. I'm taking Air Canada to London, so I'm not sure if I'll have to go through Customs before boarding to Paris. I know that I'll have to get our checked bag, so I assume I will?

AC may check bags through to AF on a separate tickets. I have seen statements that say yes and no to this, so please check with AC as to their current policies. If they will, you would follow international transfer procedures. You would not pass customs and immigration, but would go through a security check. You would transfer airside by bus from T3 to T4. If they won't, you would need to go through customs and immigration in T3, transfer by bus or train to T4, recheck bags and clear security. Don't forget that the checked bags allowance will be one 23kg suitcase on AF.

We just returned from enduring a 90 minute wait at Heathrow immigration for non-EU arrivals. The union was in a slowdown mindset and five staff members joked and laughed at the arrivals while only three workers processed people through from the three plane loads of travelers, most from US cities. There is a real chance that you could spend 2 hours in that line, depending on what the transportation union boss orders his goons to do. The union slugs finally tired of the jocularity and processed the final 1/4 of the passengers. It was a despicable display of union arrogance in an attempt to pressure the British government minister, with the Olympics and Diamond Jubilee coming up soon, to relent on the austerity measures being imposed. Things like contributing more to their pension and adding a few years to their retirement age are some of the issues causing the union disdain of non-EU arrivals at Heathrow. Best advice is to take a later Eurostar. We have decided to bypass London in the future and fly directly to other European cities until this mess is fixed.

Immigration is a crap shoot the world over. I've waited in a queue nearly 3 hours at LAX and needed to waste over half an hour convincing an officer at YYC that people do actually visit Alberta on holiday and not only to work illegally. Things into the USA tend to be a bit easier after ESTA I suppose - the silly questions seem to have reduced somewhat. Latest news I've seen is that there were no queues at all to speak of this morning at LHR with all desks staffed. Tomorrow might be different, of course.