I will be renting a car for about 5 days in France. Our rough itinerary is to spend 2 nights in the Loire Valley and the days driving to various chateaus and towns. Then to Mont. St. Michel. Then make our way east to Rouen and then visit Monet's gardens as our last stop. I am trying to figure out the best place to pick up and drop off the car. I will be near Zurich prior to France and I though Dijon would be a good starting point and it is big enough to have good options in car availability. At the end of the drive, I thought it would be easiest to drop it off at one of the airports. Our options are slightly limited because it is a Sunday and not all the offices would be open.<BR>Does this sound like the best plan or can suggest different pick-up/drop-off points? Thanks so much!<BR>

I am renting a car through AutoEurope in June and had a similar problem about where to drop it off on a Sunday. My last stop will also be Giverny. I have finally decided to drop it off in Nanterre in the NW suburbs of Paris - that office is open on Sundays. From there we can take the RER into Paris. One of the things I like best about AutoEurope is that they offer a wide choice of pick-up and drop-off points.<BR><BR>As for the pick-up, you could certainly do it in Dijon, but you would then spend a good portion of that day just getting to the Loire Valley. Viamichelin says 4 hours from Dijon to Tours, but I would be surprised if you could do it that quickly. Unless you just want to see some of the countryside or make some stops along the way, it might be more time- and cost-efficient to take the train on to Paris, then to Tours (or Blois or Amboise - the chateaux there are in the town centers) and then pick up your car there the next day. But if there are more than two of you, the car might be cheaper. You can compare prices using the AutoEurope and the SNCF sites.<BR><BR>Others may have different ideas. At least I have brought your question back to the top!

You can drop a car off even if the office isn't open in most locations. You just drop the keys and the paperwork in a box they have for just that purpose.

Thanks for the replies. I have gone to the AutoEurope site and initially tried to drop it off at Versailles and then take the train to Paris, but it comes back and tell me that the place is closed on Sunday and I can't drop off. When I chose Paris, there were some spots with drop off boxes for the keys but not all. That's why I was thinking of the airport. I will try Nanterre as a drop-off point. I appreciate the help.

I've found that not all places do have drop offs on Sundays, holidays, etc., despite what Autoeurope here in US may say. We returned a car in Italy on a Sat., a day early, and found that we had to park it in a gated lot. At the Avis drop off they told us that it was a good thing we returned it early b/c we wouldn't have been able to park it on Sun., or even after they closed at noon on Sat. <BR><BR>A few years earlier I had made plans to drop off car on Jan. 1 in Avignon. Parked car, keys in box, etc. I later was charged an extra 2 days, until Jan.3, when the office opened again. Autoeurope worked it out with the local car rental, and I got my money refunded eventually, but they did ask if I had proof that I stayed in a Strasbourg hotel (or proof of train travel) for nites of Jan 1, 2, in case they needed it to substantiate my claim that I had not kept the car for 2 extra days. <BR><BR>These experiences have made me a bit leery of Sun., holiday drop offs, to the extent that I would call the local rental office in foreign country to make sure I could do what I had planned to do for holidays, etc.