Racer042

We just returned from our trip. We rented the car at the train depot in Caen via Auto Europe. Driving in France was just fine. We used the toll roads and went through the manned booths and used our american credit cards. Interestingly, I made the mistake of going through an unmanned booth and the machine would not take my credit card. I pushed the button for assistance and a polite young freshman came over, pressed a few buttons on the back of the machine and viola, it took my credit card! So the unmanned booths are capable of taking our cards, they just are set up not to.

We drove from St. Mere Eglise to Reims and the Garmin took us through Paris. I found the Parisians drivers aggressive but not crazy. The scooter drivers, they are insane!

Drop off at CDG airport was no problem, Finding a petrol station, that took some doing. There does not seem to be any fuel stations anywhere near CDG airport. luckily we were early and found one about 10 miles away.

It was a great trip and we loved the ability to drive around the french countryside and the freedom that having a car gave us.

Sarastro

<i>There does not seem to be any fuel stations anywhere near CDG airport</i>

Interesting. There is a gas station (if I recall correctly it´s a Shell station) on the CDG entrance road from A1, the main airport access route. If you arrived from the north or west (or from anywhere along A1), you passed it as you entered the airport.

Racer042

I did not see a gas station and our Garmin did not find one except a closed Shell station about 5 kilometers away. If that's the one you are referring to, it looked like it was permanently closed.

MikeNorbury

If you are travelling via the A1 from the direction of Paris or from west of Paris (Normandie, etc) then there is a Carrefour supermarket with fuel just off that route. Easiest is go to Google Maps and simple enter "petrol station near Charles de Gaulle Airport".

JuneGirl

I know this is an old thread, but I found it helpful in planning a recent trip to France, and I thought I'd chime in with some updated information. First is to confirm that, as of June 2016, there is in fact a petrol station very close to CDG. I was coming in from the A1, and the petrol station was located between the CDG exit and the main airport complex.

Second, the rental car dropoff at CDG is not all in one location and then connected to the airport by shuttle as it in many US airports. There are multiple dropoffs among clusters of terminals throughout the airport complex. This is very convenient, but it was also a little bit confusing for me. I kept thinking that I must have missed the right place, but it was really just that my terminal happened to be a long way from the initial entrance to CDG.

Speaking of which, you need to know your departing terminal by number and letter (eg. 2E). Most of the dropoffs are grouped among 2 or three of these terminals, but then you need to know which way to walk from there.