train travel paris to amsterdam & basel to paris

Beth, it is too early to book tickets on either route for dates in December. However, you can take a look at the two websites you will need and get an idea of your options and likely costs. Just use the journey planners and put in dates in August, then come back nearer the time to reserve and pay (bookings open around 90 days from the date of travel). Paris to Amsterdam - www.thalys.com - this takes 3 hours 16 minutes and is a direct train to Amsterdam Centraal from Paris Gare du Nord. Basel to Paris - http://en.voyages-sncf.com - this French TGV Lyria service is also direct from Basel and takes around 3 hours. On that second one, specify your ticket collection country as France. This will avoid you being redirected to a US ticket agent that will charge you more.

Same with Amsterdam to Basel. It's too early to book now, but up to 90 days before your travel day, you can purchase on-line tickets from Deutsche Bahn for a substantial discount. You have many options between the two cities, but the easiest is probably take the direct ICE (Intercity Express) from Amsterdam to Frankfurt (there's 3-4 per day), and from there, take one of the frequent ICEs to Basel. To find this option, put "Amsterdam Centraal" as your departure point and "Basel Bad" as your destination. Checking a date about 90 days from today, I'm seeing tickets for as low as €59. However, the duration of the trip is 7 hours. Scenery from trains in December is generally limited, due to the usually damp weather and short periods of daylight. Reservations are not included, but if you want them, you can purchase them for a few euros extra.

Thank you both for the insight. Actually our second train trip is Basel to Paris. (Will be cruising between Amsterdam and Basel. Will check out all the sites!

Paris-Amsterdam: The standard 2nd class fare is over €100. If you book ASAP (up to 90 days allowed) on thalys.com, you can get a discount fare as low as €35 ($45 US). You can print your own tickets. Discount fare tickets are non-exchangeable and non-refundable so be sure you can commit to a specific date and time before booking. Basel-Paris: The standard 2nd class fare is 137 CHF. Book ASAP (up to 92 days allowed) on sbb.ch to get a discount fare as low as 50 CHF ($52 US). Or book ASAP (up to 92 days allowed) on voyages-sncf.com to get a Piccolissimo fare of €25 ($32 US) or a Piccolo fare of €41 ($53 US). The Piccolissimo fares sell out almost immediately. Choose France as your ticket collection country and print your own tickets.

Thanks so very much for all the information. Your help is very much appreciated. I was really not sure where to start and now I have do!

Rather than returning to Paris for your flight home, why not "fly" from Basel and avoid the extra time and cost? Actually you will probably start with a train ride from Basel to Zurich but often that is built in to the cost of the plane ticket.