Can anyone help with the cheapest way to get from London to Nice and then to Paris - I am planning a 16 day trip and this leg of the trip is getting costly...we considered flying on RyanAir into Nimes or Torino - then renting a car - does anyone know the driving time from either point? Any other suggestions would be great! Thanks a lot!

BTW - There are four of us traveling - 2 adults - 2 children.

Have you tried www.easyjet.com

According to http://www.aerfares.net/v8/index.php, easyJet generally provides the cheapest fare for London/Nice, but BMI ex-Heathrow can also be competitive depending on dates/time. easyJet also flies between Nice and Paris Orly, with some cheap fares like 45 euro incl tax in August.

I agree that easyjet or BMI is probably your best bet - - but if you do need info on driving distances, route planning, time estimates, tolls, etc, then you owe it yourself to becmoe familiar with one or both of these excellent websites:

www.viamichelin.com

or

www.mappy.com

Best wishes,

Rex

Have you checked out train-boat-train? It takes a longer time, however seeing the white cliffs at Dover are amazing!

4totravel,

As already mentioned by others, EasyJet serves both routes, while BMI is also an option for the London-Nice portion.

The Nice to Paris route is also served by Aeris (starting July 5), but their web site is only in French - here's their phone number: 011 33 825 56 56 56 (their cheapest EUR 29 fare can only be booked online though).

All these carriers price each flight segment individually, so you can mix and match carriers to get the lowest price.

www.easyjet.com
www.flybmi.com
www.aeris.fr

Hope this helps,
Andre

Flying is likely to be cheaper, but with easyjet you will have to go to an outlying airport in Britain (although Gatwick has good links) adding to the inconvenience and expense.
You could travel on the train from Waterloo, through the Tunnel and then onto Nice, along TGV lines. Likewise, you could then take the TGV from Nice to Paris.
www.eurostar.com will help
2nd class is fine

Nigel,

Besides the fact that is considerably more expensive than flying, taking the train from London to Nice is not nearly as convenient. Instead of a 2 hr flight, you are talking about an 11+ hour odyssey, involving either a horrible change of train stations in Paris or 2 changes - Lille and Valence. This makes absolutely no sense.

Depending on where 4totravel is staying, he/she might actually find it easier to get to Gatwick, Luton or Stansted (EasyJet flies from all of these to Nice) than to Heathrow (which is served by BMI). Anyway, all of these airports are reachable by train from central london in an acceptable timeframe, so I would go for the cheapest flight.

Thameslink trains, which serve Gatwick and Luton aiports from Kings Cross, London Bridge and a few other stations in London are fast and considerably cheaper than the "Express" trains to the various aiports. There are also cheaper connections from Victoria station to Gatwick airport on South Central trains (vs. the Gatwick Express on the same route) and you can always take the tube to Heathrow.

Finally, you may want to check the prices of a car service to the airport, as with 4 passengers this might be about the same price as public transportation. Swiss Cottage cars gets good marks on this forum. Do a search.

Hope this helps,
Andre

Thanks everyone for your information! This is such a great source!!

I am also traveling to London, Paris and Nice.but starting from Paris. I can confirm that the cheapest flight I found was on Easyjet from Paris to Nice, and the cheapest flight from Nice to London was BMI.