Train Services in France

Edit :Wrong thread ...

Edited by Denis Irwin - 18 Nov 2015 at 12:14pm

Cabra Hoop wrote: Inter rail passes - France 8 days travel over a 30 day period €313 for Adults and €232 for U26's. Surcharges for express trains. Check out Seat61 website, best info.

Individual tickets may work out a lot cheaper. An interrail pass is unlikely to be the best bet.

Say we end up with an itinerary like Lens, Paris, Lille: then local trains will easily be the best bet and cheap as chips.

If we end up with something like Lille, Bordeaux, Lyon, individual tickets booked in advance could be under €150, but could be more. An interrail pass doesn't include reservations for TGVs which are either €10 or €15 a time, and limited quota as well (i.e. if you have a pass, even if there are seats on the train, you might not be able to reserve a seat, if the interrail quota has all been reserved, or if the train is nearly full). The interrail pass is likely to come to over €400 total..... the most expensive TGV tickets are rarely over €100 a pop, and should be less if you are organised and book specific trains in advance.

Its obvious that SNCF as sponsors have had an input in the crazy venue layout. Absolute madness that cities haven't been paired.

Trains to venues on the day of matches will be expensive. I imagine the tickets released next month will be similar to the ones already released: they will only be a limited number of trains, to venues hosting matches, on the day of matches. The 10th March, when regular trains start going on sale, is likely to be a better bet. For example, if we are playing, say, in C2, on the 12th in Lille, 16th in Lyon and 21st in Marseille, travelling Lille to Lyon on the 14th or 15th on a regular train (not a euro 2016 matchday special), and Lyon to Marseille on the 19th (again, not on a matchday special) should be a better bet. Regular French people still need to travel and SNCF won't want to piss them off either.

I'm not saying it definitely will be, but I'd be more confident doing that and waiting til March than booking in December on the matchday specials (I doubt there will be more than those going on sale next month, anyway, although I could be wrong). Also, in respect of those on sale already, there *were* very cheap tickets when they first went on sale, in line with the normal entry prices, afaik, but they were quickly snapped up.

Just a word of warning: SNCF have been known to try crafty stuff in the past, like charging foreigners more simply for buying from abroad. If you speak French, use the French language site, or otherwise try captaintrain.com. Both of those should have the lowest prices. The UK one charges a currency conversion mark up in sterling, so definitely don't book off that one.

I'd be shocked if your train journeys were more than €300. Plus remember the costs of road tolls: €72 Lille to Marseille, according to another thread.

No train should be more than €100 even if you leave it late, and they should be a lot less.

@SD If you had to make a decision right now on a single base for the group stage what would be your choice based on using trains to get to our matches and maybe a few others as well?

Paris would be the base, if I was going to pick a base, because everywhere has loads of daily services from Paris..... but I very likely won't be using Paris as a base.

€18 reservation on TGVs with an interrail pass to be added on top though, and they also need to be booked in advance, as once the train is full, you can't get on, and all TGVs are compulsory reservation..... you'd be cheaper waiting til actual individual train tickets go on sale, in case they are cheaper. There are some €9 TGV reservations available, but not that many, and they will go quickly.

http://en.voyages-sncf.com/en/uefa-euro-2016