Gare Montparnasse to Chartres

Gare Montparnasse is a huge station with multiple levels. There will tons of ticket kiosks. They look like the self check kiosks in airports. When selecting your destination, Chartres should be all you need. You may not know which platform your train will arrive on way in advance. You’ll want to check the boards about 15 minutes before your train to confirm. I can’t confirm whether tickets need to be validated. Typically if you purchase via kiosk shortly before the departure time, they are already validated. If you buy them in advance, the yellow validation machines are along the platforms. This video might help: https://youtu.be/bOoqgghQ29E?si=hlEhNrB0iVuLZUSJ

Watch the boards as they show which track to catch a train.
Someone came through and checked our tickets. We were almost to Chartres before that happened.

Regional/local train tickets need to be validated or you could be fined. The only tickets you don't have to validate are the ones for the high-speed trains.

There should be a yellow validation machine near every train, if memory serves. (AKA "composter")

If you sit on the right facing forward, or left traveling back to Paris; you can get a glimpse of Versailles in the distance!
Not sure how far into your journey, I don’t remember, but I did see it!
If the train has an upper level, sit up there.

You no longer validate train tickets in France. As of January 1 2022.

https://www.quechoisir.org/actualite-sncf-ce-qui-change-avec-la-disparition-des-bornes-de-compostage-n105698/

https://www.lavoixdunord.fr/1275254/article/2023-01-06/fin-des-composteurs-sncf-du-coup-plus-besoin-de-valider-son-ticket-papier

I can't help you with specific answers to your questions as it was 2019 when I took that train, but wanted to give you a friendly heads-up that the station is huge and to give yourself time to buy your tickets and find your track. You can't go to just any kiosk in the station to buy, it has to be in a specific area. We had a heck of a time trying to find where we needed to be or someone who spoke english to help us.

It's actually become much simpler than has been indicated. You download the SNCF Connect app onto your phone. You buy your ticket(s) after you land while on your way to Montparnasse Station, ie the same day as you are traveling. You check the board when you get to the station, find your platform, and get into your train. It's a local, so no seat reservations.

With the electronic system now in effect, you don't have to worry about machines, kiosks, having your ticket stamped. You may have your ticket scanned by a controller (conductor in English) before boarding, once on the train, or not at all.

@Bets but this is only if you have the app and buy your ticket there, correct? If you buy a hard copy ticket at a machine, don't you still need to have it validated at one of those yellow kiosks? I bought a ticket at a machine in the train station last fall and got it validated at a kiosk. I do recall a conductor or someone else on the train checking tickets on my way to Chartres.

No, as states above, since January 2022, no tickets have to be validated / composted. They are gradually removing the machines.

Sorry Kim, I missed your post above. That is good news because it seemed silly to have to take another step on top of buying a ticket...but I did it anyway in September 2022 because no one told me differently and the validation/composter machines were still there. 😄 Plus, I had read many horror stories about people who did not validate their ticket and were fined a lot of money.

Last year I bought my ticket using the app. Very easy. Trust the locals; Bets advise is spot on. My ticket was scanned on the train about half way to Chartres.

Are you spending time in Paris pre-tour? Your hotel can arrange a taxi to take you to the train station. If you can, go to Chartres a day early to enjoy the town.

Have a fun tour. It’s great.

They are gradually removing the machines.

Am I interpreting this correctly that there will be no option to buy tickets except via the app in the future?

They are removing the ticket validation machines, not the ticket selling machines.

By the way, trains to Chartres usually depart from the right hand side as you face the tracks, but check the boards. Final destination of the train is either Chartres itself, Nogent-le-Rotrou, or Le Mans.

WOW...so much information. Thank you so much everyone. You answered questions I hadn't even thought of. BTW, I am going to Chartres on Fri a.m. for a Sun evening tour start. A friend here on the forum recommended I stay at a B & B in Chartres and I am really looking forward to what I expect will be a relaxing way to get over jet lag. I am only staying in Paris for 2 nights and for my full day there I plan on just walking around Canal St. Martin and walking on the Coulee Verte. I've been to Paris several times (lucky me) and decided this trip not to fight the crowds at the usual sites visited.

I stayed in a very cute Airbnb in the Canal St. Martin neighborhood in 2018. Great, walkable area!

Sunday morning there is a Sunday market in the covered Marché aux Légumes at Pl Billard. It was more like a flea market, but something different to see and do. I was on the same tour a year ago September; I doubt if much has changed. I collect antique magazines and one of the vendors had lots. I bought a couple although I don't speak French.

A couple good restaurants: Le Café Serpente and La Passacaille, both near the cathedral. If your tour is staying at Campanile Chartres Centre, be aware that not all the front desk staff speaks English. If you don't speak French, learn the polite words, have a translator app (which I didn't need to use) and you will have no problems communicating.

Depending on when you are arriving in Chartres, you may be able to catch this really fun harvest parade which includes animals. I just stumbled upon this by accident when I arrived there last year ahead of my tour and it was so cute and entertaining! 🪿

https://www.chartres.fr/agenda/detail/fete-des-vendanges-2023