max_oblivion

Dear all,

A novice traveller seeking advices.

We will be in Paris at the end of may. We are planning to stay 3 nights in Lourdes and 2 nights in Paris. Can anyone give the following advices:

1. What is the most reasonable (economical and comfortable) ways of travelling between Paris and Lourdes? Keep hearing on TGV and eurostar, what is the difference on both? When I tried to book online (via tgv.co.uk, directrail.com, eurorail.com, etc.) they all quote different prices, sometime the difference is quite BIG for the same train (GBP 60 vs EURO 120, for example) .. is there anything I should know?

2. Recommendation for "reasonable" hotels in Lourdes and Paris? Something around EUR70 in lourdes and EUR100 in paris?

3. Things to do in Lourdes and the surrounding areas? Heard that there are several must-see areas around Lourdes.

Thanks in advance

Michael

There was another thread on Lourdes, and you might want to look at it. Must sees outside Lourdes would be the high Pyrenees, such as the Cirque de Gavarnie and the Pic du Midi de Bigorre.

klondike

You are probably too late to get a Prem fare from the voyages-sncf web sit, but you could always try.

We enjoyed the Hotel de Nevers in Lourdes:
www.hoteldenevers-lourdes.com/ and it fits in your price range, has a (small) lift, back rooms were wonderfully quiet and overlook the car park which has a pretty grotto to Notre Dame in it. Not too far from the train station, but taxis are easily available as well. Easy to reserve through the Logis de France web site if you like the look of it.

max_oblivion

And should we be taking TGV or Air France? Is there anything that we can see/do during the 6 hours trip on TGV?

seafox

We took an AF flight, connecting from CDG it was very easy. But, please read the other posts on Lourdes. You may want to visit for a day, but spending 3 in Lourdes may be a bit much.

Nikki

This is a link to the thread with many interesting views on Lourdes:
http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=35118381.

max_oblivion

Thanks for all the advices folks. Have seen so many pro and cons on the other thread.

I need another advices from all of you regarding how to get to lourdes from paris.

1. TGV .. is there anything we can do inside the train during the 6 hours trip? Is the trip itself enjoyable?

2. Checked airfrance website. Paris-Lourdes is using small plane (canadair regional jet 700 with 80 passengers), going back by fokker 100 (100 passenger) .. I have never used such small planes. Have any of you travel in such planes? If yes, kindly share your experience.

Thanks in advance.

litefoot

I believe the eurorail site sells train passes. In my search for train options I found you will need to reserve a seat on the SNCF trains which is an additional charge above the eurorail pass.

We just returned from a trip from Lourdes (via Nevers and Lisieux) and optioned taking the point to point train round trip Paris to Lourdes TGV. It was about a 5 hour train ride, 2nd class. Pleasant, beautiful views, we fell asleep off and on. It was quiet on the train and most people read or slept. There is a bar car on the train. The seats have folding trays and the center seats in car have a table. Kids played cards there, you could probably play a game. I'm not sure how you choose those seats. Both trains to/from Lourdes made about 4 stops close to Lourdes before going highspeed to/from Paris.

I purchased my tickets through the SNCF site. Found the following info on Fodor's which converted the site to English. I take no credit for this and would like to thank the person who posted it.

Go to http://tinyurl.com/2shmfn. You'll get a page on the SNCF site with the heading "Document non trouvé."
2. Click on the British flag icon. Wait a moment for the page to re-set. (It will look like nothing has changed.)
3. Click on the "consulter le plan du site" link.
4. Under the Train heading click on "Réservation billet train."
5. Finally you'll get the old booking page in English (with a French heading).
6. Leave France as the default country for retrieving your tickets, do NOT choose cancellation insurance, and proceed to complete your booking.

We stayed at the Citea Saint Jean, clean, quiet, kitchenette, close to the grotto. The price was 50E per night (pre season).

baldrick

Train or plane: I would say the most comfortable is the train. Train stations are in the city centers, you can arrive 10 minutes prior to departure, your seat is bigger than in the airplane, no hassle to go to an airport 2 hours before departure, good sightseeing in the countryside, more relaxing than an airplane. On the train you can read a book, play cards, have a drink, chat with your neighbours,... you can do a lot more than on an airplane.

As for Lourdes... there is a lot more to see in France than Lourdes...

bkk95

max - hope this is not too late with your planning.

We did the Paris/Lourdes trip last month and took the AF flight from Orly to Lourdes. In retrospect, we should have taken the train.

Our flight from the US landed at CDG in the early morning but the flight to Lourdes wasn't until 4pm. After transferring to ORY, we waited at Orly basically the entire day. My parents commented that they would have rather taken the train.

The plane ride down was fine. It was a 2x2 configuration and were served some refreshments. Because it was only one hour, not a big deal but I was able to use that time to nap.

If you are flying into Lourdes (LDE), make sure that you reserve a taxi to take you into town. We did reserve and our taxi driver asked if we could share the ride into town with another traveler, which was fine with us. The regular cost was 25€ but because we shared, the driver charged us 15€. I reserved the taxi through www.taxi-lourdes.com.

As for hotel stays in the price range you mentioned, we stayed at the Citea St Jean and found it to be in a great location - minutes to the grotto.

In Paris, we stayed at the Ibis Paris Avenue de Italie for 93€/night (near the Chinatown area). Small yet comfortable for our purposes. Breakfast was extra but worth it. The metro stop is Place d'Italie and is about a 5-10 min walk from the hotel.

max_oblivion

we are going to be in lourdes/paris at the end of may/early june. so ... fire away, the more advises, the better

thanks for all the advices, folks ...

max_oblivion

By the way, already book lourdes taxi from Lordes Tarbes airport to hotel.

How about for the return trip between hotel to the Lourdes Tarbes airport? Should I be booking it also, or just get a cab in front of the hotel?

How easy it is to get a taxi in Lourdes? Thanks.

max_oblivion

And yet another question:

On the Paris side.
Between Orly airport and Paris City, what is the most reasonable transport that we should use?

We will be carrying some small luggages. Heard that trip in trains will be uncomfortable if we are carrying luggages.

Thanks for all the advice

bkk95

I would suggest that you book the taxi ahead of time or have your hotel book you a taxi the day before going to the airport.

As for the most reasonable transport from Orly to the city, we used the train since it was easy to use. Our party of 3 had 1 small luggage each as did most others going into the city. However, if you are arriving at night and are tired, then a taxi may be better.

I used these threads to help me with Orly transport options -
http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=35114380
http://www.fodors.com/forums/threads...p;tid=35105766

fourgypsies8

Here's how we did it on our own. We were 5 people travelling, all first timers. We booked a hotel (Innova on rue Pasteur) near Gare Montparnasse as we were taking the train (TGV) to Lourdes. Innova is very reasonable (about euro100/night)One day prior to our departure to Lourdes we went to Gare Montparnasse to book our tickets. Return fare costs us euro800 per person economy from Paris to Lourdes in april. i dont know if rates go up in the summer. The train travel was comfortable and we took the 7am trip. We reached Lourdes in time for lunch. Took a cab from the train station at Lourdes to our hotel. We stayed at Citea Lourdes St. Jean (they are online) and a double room costs euro65. It is clean, new and about five minutes walk to the sanctuary. I would recommend this hotel. Actually it is an apartel with spacious rooms and kitchenette in each room. They also serve meals if you dont want to cook. We were able to go to the baths, the basilica, and grotto,and most of the shops, etc all in one day and a half. The people are wonderful and english is spoken widely. Lourdes was filled to the brim with students and pilgrims while we were there, it being the jubilee year. We took a cab the following day, from our hotel to the train station. We reached Paris at 11pm and though wary about Paris streets at night we walked to the Innova without any problems at all. By the way, because we only carried small luggage going to Lourdes, the luggage storage facility at Innova was a great plus.
I hope this helps somewhat. Good luck on your trip. We enjoyed our trip so much we hope to go back soon

fourgypsies8

CORRECTION PLS!
the cost of TGV travel return fare for each person to Lourdes from Paris in april is euro86.60 and not euro800 as in my previous post. my apolgies for the typo.