Hiring car near Paris

I'd suggest Versailles because you can get there on an RER train. But the rental car agencies are a bit of a walk.

If you pick up your card at Gare du Nord, though, you have a single boulevard that takes you to the Peripherique and from there the Autoroutes.

Versailles means an extra train ticket and time -

Pam - if you could tell me which direction exactly you plan to go (town would be helpful) and where in Paris you will be staying - I can make a recommendation of where to go in the Banlieeu just outside the peripherique to pick up a car and avoid the drive through Paris.

Pam... We always do what you are doing..stay in Paris a while and then rent a car and drive. If you are going south my suggestion is to take a shuttle or cab to Orly Airport and get your car there. It is very easy to get on the toll roads from there. This past May we rented from Hertz at Orly, got on the A6 and drove to Burgundy, the Dordogne , and south to Provence. If you rent from home you get a much better deal. We got a discount, Delta skymiles, an upgrade when we got there, and a GPS. The GPS is wonderful, however it comes in French and somewhat difficult to change into other languages unless one is familiar with them. My husband fiddled with it and we made it into English and used it a lot. Hertz is pushing the Toyota Prius so we got an upgrade to it. This would not be big enough for all of you, but they have many vans,etc. Ask them to show you a map and tell you how to get on the tollway you want. Also when we went into the terminal to the Hertz desk to register, the guy

tried to sell us a GPS at 13 Euros a day. WE were not going to pay that so we said no. When we got to where we picked up the car they said it came with the car for free. Hmm. So we could have paid for it when it came with the car we had.

Pam, I would rent a car right in Paris and drive out. As long as you wait until the rush hour has passed, and lay out a route on a street map, driving out of Paris is not difficult. We rented a car from the Avis office a couple of blocks from our Rue Cler hotel. It was easy and very reasonable.

Pam, make sure that your car has a GPS, or buy one here, learn how to use it, and then drive anywhere you want!

We bought our TomTom 920 here and took it with us for our Christmass trip to Germany and Portugal. (didn't have to worry about a language issue!)

I could drive anywhere I wanted, even during rush hour in Lisbon, on country roads, on roundabouts with multiple exits, etc, and not worry about where the next turn was, or about missing a critical turn.

And yes, even with the GPS I would occasionally miss a turn; but who cares? It would re-plot a new route for me, and off we would go. Best EU road trip we ever took.

Start by going to the autoeurope.com web site,(they are a broker that handles all of the majors) and look at all of the locations they have avalaible to pick up your rental car. Check pricing and car availability at each site that appeals to you, and book your car here.

Pam, I agree with previous poster Ron. People are fond of hyperventilating about city traffic in Europe. I've done a lot of driving in Europe (and Australia!) and for the decently confident driver it's rarely as bad as some suggest. The reality is that there is not a conspiracy on the part of Parisians to run you off the road. It's essential you be armed with a very detailed map of Paris. Rent a car from one of the many rental offices at Gare De Lyon and drive south out of Paris. You may make a wrong turn here and there and drive in an unintentional direction for awhile, but eventually you'll get where you want to go. I don't see the sense in a family of six spending a bunch of time and effort merely to avoid driving in Paris for a small amount of time. Others may disagree, and they sometimes do. Only you can decide the extent to which the prospect of driving in unfamiliar territory frightens you, or doesn't.

Thanks all so much for your replies. We will be heading either to the Loire or towards Dijon traveling in July. We wanted to show the children some of the French countryside (and maybe a Chateaus/Castle) before heading to Switzerland. Pam

You don't mention time or ages but I just want to add don't dismiss trains right-out. While the country side is nice to drive through, it is a long way to the south and not all of it is pretty.

A family of six qualifies for a discount, some children are very cheap (my son paide 10E to Nice), and the TGV down south is reliable and quick. I don't know what petrol costs in Au but it will also be expensive to drive all those distances. If this is purely a financial decision look around and compare costs.