chunnel or ferry London to Brittany
 

planning on 2 weeks + in Brittany next April-May. We can fly direct into London on AA from PHX.
Thought we would have to then fly to Paris and then train to a Brittany city and rent a car.

Then I thought about flying into London and then getting a train or ferry into Brittany to rent a car.

any ideas how this is done from Heathrow to train station or ferry port and where it goes in Brittany

Are you renting a car in France? If so it is probably easier to use Eurostar, but have a look at https://www.brittany-ferries.co.uk/

Hello, do you want to go to Paris first? If so then take the Eurostar to Paris and then go to Brittany. You can buy return tickets about six months out. I have done the ferry from France and it wasn't bad but does make for a long day of travel.

https://www.brittany-ferries.co.uk/f...tsmouth-france You could land and spend the night in Portsmouth, visit the Mary Rose and other Navy attractions, get the ferry next day. It is just a long trip. I would take the Eurostar and spend first night in Paris. Heti, just saw your post. I enjoyed the ferry one way. It was sort of fun and for ten euro they gave us a little cabin.

I wouldn't miss an opportunity to spend at least a short time in Paris on the way to Bretagne. Taking the train in this case.

https://www.seat61.com/France.htm#Rennes

I you'd rather skip Paris and go from London to Bretagne I'd take a ferry from Portsmouth to St. Malo.

https://www.seat61.com/London-Paris-ferry.htm

"The Man in Seat 61 says "Going Portsmouth-St Malo will take longer than going Portsmouth-Le Havre, but it's a treat - the ship used on this route is the wonderful Bretagne, a true cruise ferry, with a few sailings operated by the superb luxurious Pont Aven. With an earlier evening departure from Portsmouth you get to experience sailing past the naval dockyard, HMS Victory & HMS Warrior and the Spinnaker Tower, as dinner is served on board in the elegant restaurant. Retire to your en suite cabin, as good as any hotel room, and wake up in France..."

If you have to go back to London for the return flight you could travel one way by ferry and the other way by train. Varietas delectat.

Are you going to spend all your time in Bretagne?

I'd be tempted to add a few days on the Channel Islands and sort of island hop back to Britain.

https://www.seat61.com/ChannelIslands.htm

Agree with Janisj; flying will be fastest. If you don't mind adding hours to your journey, have a look at various ways to travel to Brittany on www.rome2rio.com.
It lists travel time between LHR and St Malo between 5h16 and 18 hours, depending on mode of transport.

Sometimes travel is part of the adventure. We got super cheap nonstop flights to Gatwick on Virgin Atlantic. My husband has always wanted to take the chunneltunneleurostar. We are doing it to Paris and then after a couple of days flying to Berlin. The flights to Berlin were a bit sparse for our arrival day and we love any excuse for Paris. Tons of options for Berlin from there. You might be like that and the ferry ride was very nice. You have several options so think about it. Just enjoy.

I totally agree - especially about the "travel is part of the adventure"!
I still use Chunnel. Why not? I was excited when it was built and just as excited decades later when I took the train ride through the Chunnel. I have a lot of photos I took at the time. Maybe I can find them and upload, but I really enjoyed watching the monitors on the train show where we were, how deep, etc. There's an app you can download for kids that's interactive.

The train ride was great and, as others have pointed out, may be faster than the flight when you add in the additional wait time at the airport.

Here's a link to the kids app -
https://www.eurostar.com/us-en/destinations/odyssey

Watch our video for a little taste of the adventures that await you. And there’s so much more to explore once you’re on board.

Our magical underwater world comes to life in the Oceanarium. How many different creatures will you be able to collect for your explorer’s log?

The train then passes an eerie shipwreck which was lost at sea almost 300 years ago. Will you spot Esther the octopus guarding her haul of hidden treasure?

Our voyage of exploration ends in the darkest depths of the abyss. Some of the most colourful creatures swim down here. How many will you see?

Well, yes, it depends on what kind of sense of adventure you have and how quickly you want to get there. I'd choose janis's way, but not everyone would. At any rate, I wouldn't call it the chunnel. That seems absolutely archaic to me, and I'm no spring chicken.

Here's part of what eurostar says about the chunnel - on their chunnel page of the eurostar website -

What is the Chunnel?

The Channel Tunnel (often called the 'Chunnel' for short) is an undersea tunnel linking southern England and northern France. It is operated by the company Eurotunnel, who also run a railway shuttle (Le Shuttle) between Folkestone and Calais, carrying passengers in cars, vans and other vehicles.

Eurostar is a totally separate company and is Eurotunnel's biggest customer, running high-speed passenger services through the Channel Tunnel between London and a number of other European cities on the continent, including Paris, Brussels, Lille, Lyon, Avignon and Marseille.

The Chunnel is actually comprised of three tunnels: two rail tunnels, used for freight and passenger trains, and a service tunnel.How long is the Chunnel?

The Chunnel is 31.5 miles long or 50.45 km. That's the equivalent of 169 Eiffel Towers stacked on top of each other.

23.5 miles (37.9 km) of the Chunnel is under the English Channel, making it the world's longest undersea tunnel.When was the Chunnel built?

The idea of a tunnel under the Channel was first proposed in 1802 but construction wasn't started until 1988. It was completed in 1993, and Eurostar services started in November 1994.

more at the link -
https://www.eurostar.com/us-en/travel-info/the-chunnel

The lowest CO2 route would be by train especially as French trains operate on Uranium Electricity. Much as I like the Channel Islands I'd not spend time there unless you are over 70.

In terms of practicalities, let me comment on some basic choices.

If you want to take the train, you'd first need to get from Heathrow to St. Pancras station in central London; there are no direct trains but you could ride the Underground - takes around an hour - to Kings Cross/St. Pancras. Or you could take a car service; either way it's a schlep, especially if you're doing it after a LONG overnight flight from Arizona. You'd then have to cross Paris to a different station in order to take the train to Brittany (say Rennes.) The whole thing sounds exhausting to me, but YMMV.

On the other hand, British Airways has a daily flight (departing in the early evening) from Heathrow to Nantes airport (NTE) in Britanny. The one-way fare from Heathrow to Nantes is £54, which is less than the Eurostar from London to Paris, never mind from Heathrow to St. Pancras and Paris to someplace in Brittany. In one scenario you're spending most of a full day in transit; in the other you hang around Heathrow for a couple of hours after your Phoenix flight has arrived, and have your moules frites and cider in Brittany. The choice would be dead easy for me.

The train journey maybe be an 'adventure' -- but makes no sense if one is landing at LHR and wants to get directly to France. Sure, the train to Paris is less than 2.5 hours. But after immigration formalities, the hour-ish from LHR to St Pancras, the 45 minute advance check for the Eurostar -- the very earliest train one could possibly book would have to be 3+ hours after arrival at LHR and that would be cutting it awfully close. 4 or even 5 hours would be more doable. So after an early AM wake up call in Phoenix, a 10+ hour over night flight, 5 hours til boarding the Eurostar, 2+ hours on the train to Paris, transfer to a different station, then a train to Brittany. . . Let's just say that is a gawd awful trek - not an adventure.

HOWEVER . . . IF you want a few days in London (or somewhere else in England) - then yes the train, or even a ferry would be great. Just not from LHR on arrival day . . .

>>I’d personally avoid LHR it’s a horrible place unless you’re a farmyard animal. <<

Unfortunately that isn't an option for the OP . . . they are arriving at LHR.

I wouldn't call taking the channel tunnel an adventure. It doesn't have good scenery either, since it often travels through a ditch with no view whatsoever.
If you're in central London, it's the best way to go though.

The thing about calling it the Chunnel is that it's not really helpful; it's the Eurostar if you want the passenger service from St Pancras, or Shuttle if you take the car service between Folkestone and Calais. And chunnel.com takes you to a very silly site. Much better to use eurostar.com or eurotunnel.com

Since you are flying to LHR, it is quite obvious that you might as well connect to a flight to Paris or Nantes, which would be the logical choice. If you like additional complications (which I will confess that I often do), then it is perfectly normal to take the Eurostar or a ferry from, for example, Newhaven to Dieppe. Don't ask me how to get from LHR to Newhaven!

"The thing about calling it the Chunnel is that it's not really helpful; it's the Eurostar if you want the passenger service from St Pancras, or Shuttle if you take the car service between Folkestone and Calais."

You're talking about 2 different things: Chunnel=Channel Tunnel - the structure Eurostar=the train service operating via the Chunnel. That said, Chunnel is not widely used in everyday talk, despite what it says on the Eurostar site. Most people say Channel tunnel or simply the tunnel.

"Much as I like the Channel Islands I'd not spend time there unless you are over 70."

What does it have to do with age?

Of course the 'chunnel' is the actual tunnel. But you don't book the chunnel; you book the Eurostar or Shuttle. I don't know anybody who calls the Eurotunnel 'Chunnel', but it's a free world, use whatever you like. Maybe it's a bit like calling New York the Big Apple. I'm sure locals love it when people do that.

Seriously, have you looked at the chunnel.com site? Who is that aimed at? 5-year olds?

Just like San Franciscans absolutely love to hear people say Frisco.