We are planning a day trip from Paris to Reims and were wondering about how long we should budget for time.

We would like to take the train. I am finding schedules that will get us there about 10:30am. They have one train going back at 6:30pm, or 8:00 pm.

I know we're not going to be able to see everything, but a tour of one of the Champagne cellars is our top priority. Anything else we could squeeze in would be great.

Will we be able to do a tour, plus lunch and something else in 5 hours, or should we try for the later train to get another 1 1/2 hours?

Thanks in advance for the suggestions.

I have found that the schedules on the internet aren't very good. Try Rail Europe's website for the schedule. But buy your ticket at the station. You leave from Gare d'Est and it takes about an hour to an hour and a half. You can walk around the town and have lunch and enjoy the day. The cellar tours are very good.

Have you tried the official French railways site, sncf.com?

Time in Reims...six hours should do it nicely, giving you time to see the historic cathedral and at least one Champagne house.

sncf doesn't give you a full schedule. We and my friend in France used it to get schedules but it only listed non-stop and non-changes. Rail Europe had a complete schedule. Reims has a lot of trains every day back and forth. Not just the two listed for the above poster.

SNCF lists all runs, and many from Reims that involve changes at Epernay. They are usually much more complete than raileurope.com.

However, that's a popular day trip, so Raileurope is pretty extensive in their listings for that route (in comparison to many other places where they only list a couple of the actual possibilities). I always use SNCF because I think it is more accurate and more complete.

For example, I just checked SNCF for a hypothetical date, Sept. 14th, and they list trains from Reims almost every hour, many of them involving changes. I wouldn't want a train from Reims that involved changes, myself, however, and would go with the direct routes.

The problem is that while they have a lot of trains, there are limited direct routes from Reims to Paris. So the ones you found are the most likely for those wanting a day trip and wanting one without changes, and getting back to Paris at a reasonable time. It's up to you, there is a lot to see there. I think I probably got there around 10:30 and was ready to go back in late afternoon. You can see a lot in that time frame, I think. There isn't any need to reserve a ticket in advance, though, for a specific train, so you can play it by ear. If you buy a ticket from SNCF, it will be good all day. I don't even think they allow reservations for a specific time on that route.

Just to add confusion, when we did this, we stopped at Epernay on the way back and enjoyed our tour of Monet there even more than the two tours we did in Reims. Epernay is nice because the beautiful street of "champagne estates" is quite close to the train station.

We were in the champagne region in the summer, and stayed overnight in Reims (arrived around 4 pm, left around 1 pm the next day). I wish we'd budgeted more time to explore. I would definitely recommend that you take the later train back to Paris.

We visited the Pieper Heidsieck champagne house, which offers a good (although rather Hollywoodish) tour. Splurge on the 3-champagne degustation after the tour. We had spent most of our time in the region visiting smaller, independent champagne houses. This was one of the two major houses we visited. The other was Mercer, in Epernay; it has an informative entertaining tour, but mediocre champagne. Pieper Heidsieck has much better champagne and you get to taste it in a rather dramatically decorated nightclub-style bar. But you might want to supplement this visit with a visit to a less glitzy, more informative tour at another house.

You might want to splurge on a taxi or two during the day, because some the places you want to visit are spread out (perhaps several kilometres apart). You could walk, but if you're pressed for time, you might want to save a little time and energy by using a taxi.

We enjoyed our visit to La Musée de la Rendition (Eisenhower's HQ and the war room where the German's first signed a surrender document at the end of WWII).

Also, I'm not sure the tour will still be promoted when you get to Reims, but when we were there, they were promoting an Art Deco walking tour of Reims. Several weeks later, we found a book on the Art Deco architecture of Reims in the museum bookshop at the Louvre. If you like architecture or Art Deco, it's a good investment for your trip to Reims.

Reims is a lovely place there are plenty of places to eat in and around the main road in the town area and lots of shops selling bottles of Champagne with personalised labels, don't both with them buy the good stuff in a champagne cave when you do a tour. You must see the Notre Dame Cathedral it is not too be missed. It is were the Kings of France were crowned and is alo were Joan of Arc retreated to to re gain her strength. When I stayed there I stayed in the Holiday Inn Garden Court and the main drag of resturants and shops was just a couple of minutes walk down the end of the road When went to the Mumm champagne Cvaes for as visit. This was a few years ago and it only cost £5 for a taxi. One of the party with us had a ba dleg so we did not lok at how esle to get there, this website should help you. www.mumm.com

It seems if booking in advance, you get a cheaper rate...is this the case?

I went to sncf.com and looked up the fare in October, they were 10 euro each (non-exchangeable, non-refundable).

If I do a search for this Thursday for example, they are 40. I am thinking about booking in advance...at 20 e for two, it might be worth it. Is there a reason for train schedules/fares to be all over the place?

yes, the reason is that sometimes they have discounted fares when purchased in advance, but that also means they are nonrefundable and nonexchangeable. A full fare ticket can be refunded/exchanged. The schedules you find on SNCF should show you that -- usually when they have reduced fares, you can see the price of the same thing regular fare. Also, fares may different slightly depending on the popularity of a time/day. I think the regular RT fare is around 44 euro, but 10 euro would be a reduced special fare for only one-way, isn't it? So you are really comparing 20 euro to 44 euro.

Champagne caves and world-famous cathedral and a very interesting WWII Room in a former school where the Allied High Command plotted the final assault on Germany - room left as is with original war maps on the wall, etc. and table indicating where each hottie tot general sat. Right behind train station.
Best rail schedules are at www.bahn.de - a good way to access the English schedule page of the bahn.de site, the best i've seen for schedules throughout Europe, is to go to the homepage of www.budgeteuropetravel.com and click on the link All European Railway Schedules or some such nomenclature and instantly pops up the English schedule page where you just put in Paris and Reims and the date and time you want to leave and you'll get all the schedules. The home page i've referenced also gives several good tips on how to use the amazing bahn.de site.

ttt

Epernay is the epicenter of the Champagne industry - though there's little spectacular to see in this pleasant regional town, the town's Champagne houses i believe have a better reputation for quality Champagne than does Reims and perhaps are better tours.

I really enjoyed the museums of Reims, as well as the cathedral, which has stunning stained glass windows by Chagall. Now I admit I am not remotely interested in champagne and don't even like it, but if I were doing a day trip, I would want to see some of the outstanding things in Reims (the cathedral is very important historically) rather than just tour a champagne maker. I don't know that they have better tours in Epernay, maybe so, but I've read people enjoyed them in Reims very much. I think there were some reviews on here, probably by Indytravel. They differ, and Steinbicker's book Day Trips in France gives a good map and information on Reims, as well as describing the differences in some of the tours.

I was going to mention that I really liked visiting the musem which was Eisenhower's headquarters. This isn't just where they plotted things, it's where the Germans surrendered (I think it is called the Museum of the Surrender or Recapitulation). The map room, and some of the archived film footage they had running was fascinating. Aside from that, Reims does have several very nice museums -- the Beaux Arts museum has a nice small collection, and the St Remi basilca and abbey/museum are worth seeing, as well as some other places. But there isn't enough time to do all that in one day, unfortunately, you have to pick and choose.

If you are looking at Champagne houses I would suggest Tattinger. We had a great experience there 2 yrs ago. It is not a long distance from the train Sta. I would leave on the earlier train. a champ. tour should be 1 1/2 hrs so add the cathedral and lunch and you have 5 hrs. you could do something in Paris when you get back.