kygirl59

We will be arriving in Paris the morning of May 9. We want to go to Munich until May 12. My husband has to work the 13, 14, 15 in Paris and then we are taking a late afternoon or early evening train to La Baule. He will work in La Baule on the 16th and after that we are on our own to explore until the 20th. We want to visit Mont Saint Michele and some of the Loire Valley. With doing this would it be better to rent a car in this area or take the trains? If the trains, should we get a 4 day Eurorail pass and take the train to Munich the first part of the trip. Airfare to Munich from Paris is $157. Hope this isn't too confusing for you experts but I'm totally confused.
NOTE: I was in Paris with him two years ago and went Normandy so no need to go there again. Want to see different things on this trip. J'taime Paris

bob_brown

The train from Paris to Munich is a little over 6 hours, best time.
If you look at the Deutsche Bahn website, which is a lot easier to use than the SNCF abomination, you might be able to get low-fare tickets provided you can commit to a specific time and date.

The lowest fare I saw was €138 second class per person.

You can add to your airplane fare the cost of getting between the city center and the airports.

In Paris the trip to either Orly or CDG is non trivial, an hour or so, plus the advanced time you need for security checking, which is not like a TSA check in the States. In Munich the bus or the S-Bahn each take about 45 minutes to the main station. The bus of course is dependent more on traffic conditions.

Flying probably would be qicker, but whether or not it is a significant amount is a judgment call. By the time you add in travel time to and from the airports and measure total elapsed time from a Paris hotel door to a Munich hotel door, I wonder if the difference would be as much as 2 hours.

With the train you can arrive at the station in time to find your train, get on it, and go. No baggage to check, no security check, and you travel virtually city center to city center.

Besides on the train you can view the passing scenery.

Pinchme_iam_dreaming

Last Sept we Paid 99 Euro all in on Air Berlin fron Orly to MUC. The plane was a Fokker 100 Jet and very nice. The flight was half full so my wife and I had 3 seats. It was about an hour flight. They served drinks, Sandwiches and cookies. It was the best service we have ever had in economy.

ira

Hi K,

>We will be arriving in Paris the morning of May 9. We want to go to Munich until May 12.

It would be much, much easier to fly into Munich and out of Paris.

Airfare would be nearly the same.

www.bahn.de has places in a 4-person couchette for 49E pp.

A double sleeper would be 156E pp.

I don't expect a railpass to save you any money.

You can find costs of trains in France at www.voyages-sncf.com.

You will have to know a little French.

kygirl59

The reason I am not flying into Munich is that I already purchased my tickets to Paris thinking that my husband would be working there from May 9-19. However work plans have changed which in turn changed ours. This gives us the 9-12th to be on our own and since he LOVES BEER I thought it would be great to go to Munich for the weekend and possibly do a side trip. He doesn't have his ticket yet. Since his company is buying his ticket he has to stay within the fare limit for our city-CDG. Going from our city-MUC-CDG-our city is incredibly more expensive. We'll probably just pay for his ticket from CDG-MUC. The fare is $147.00 USD on Air France. We will have three hours from the time our flight gets into Paris until the time we catch the flight to Munich. We should be in Munich airport by mid-afternoon and will leave Munich early evening (8:30 ish). I really liked the idea of the train but it was more expensive and we wouldn't get in until later. The biggest pain will be getting into CDG late on the 12th. Does anyone know how late the trains run from the airport? I think we are staying in the 14th e

AisleSeat

Kayak shows RT CDG/MUC on your dates at $123 on Lufthansa. If you are already at CDG I would fly. The S-Bahn into the heart of Munich is €17 for a partner ticket. It akes 45 minutes to get the Marienplatz or the Hauptbahnhof.

kygirl59

Aisleseat,

Thanks for the price on Luftansa but the times on Air France help us to maximize our time in Munich and the surrounding area since we have such a short time to begin with. I already know I'll probably want to come back for a longer time.

AisleSeat

It is always good to be able to choose which plane you want if it is within a few dollars one way or the other.

Robespierre

Are your amenable to breaking up the trip? If so, a Thalys discount fare to Cologne could get you into Germany at a decent rate (they're showing 57€ for the 9th - rack rate) last August. Spend the night there, and enjoy the excellent food and BEER (Kölsch) available down in the Altstadt. Or at my favorite, Gilden Brauhaus.

Then you can game the DB Happy-Weekend Land-Ticket offer. For 35€, up to 5 adults can travel all over Germany on a weekend day (midnight to 3AM the next night). No ICE travel allowed.

I get a total of 149€ for the two of you.

kygirl59

Robespierre,
Thanks for the suggestions. I opted for the plane because we would be in Germany in 2 hours and I believe the train ride would be significantly longer. In addition we will be in the airport already so it's not a hassle.
THanks again.
Kygirl