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help with night trains

I've been looking up travel times between cities and I'm trying to work out some awkward ones. Using a Global Rail pass my friend and I are doing a 6 week Euro trip. Is there an easy way to look up night train connections? The ones I'm interested in are Tours, France to San Sebastian, Nice to Chamonix, and Barcelona to Nice.

I've looked them all up on the suggested website and most of them depart around 5:00pm and arrive around 6:00am to 11:00am. These durations don't really save that much time if they are cutting into half my day.

Posted by
6898 posts

I wasn't aware that there were any more night trains to Nice from Barcelona but I do see a run that involves 2 night trains. You board the first at Cerbere at 20:42 and you transfer at Montpellier Saint-Roch to a second night train. Interestingly, it's a an almost 6.0hrs wait in Montpellier Saint-Roch before the 5:08am train departs for Nice.

Have you considered flying? www.vueling.com has a flight from Barcelona to Nice that departs at 21:20 and arrives at 22:40 so this saves your precious daylight.

Posted by
10344 posts

Chamonix can be awkward to get to from Nice by train, in one go, especially at night, a number of stops and changing trains. It would be easier for you if you could "sneak up" on Chamonix by making a sight-seeing stop at an intermediate destination that's to the west or northwest from Chamonix. The problem approaching from Nice in one go is that the Alps are in the way. Anyway, you may have to take what you get, see schedules on the usual Bahn website that I think you've already discovered.