Seat Selection on Thalys train?
 

I need to book 2 tickets soon (in a few days) on Thalys from Paris to Brussels.

I have been doing some dummy bookings to familiarize myself with the process. I have used voyages-sncf.com, tgv-europe.com, and thalys.com

All 3 seem to give the same trains and same prices.

When I click on a train, the option of "choose my seat" comes up. The choices are:

Square
Kiosk
Eurofamily (or some similar term)

I tried Square - and the seats assigned are both aisle: #62 & #66

I tried Kiosk - again both are aisle: #22 & #26

Seems to be for those, we'll end up sitting across the aisle from one another, instead of together. Should I leave it to "no preference"?

I can't guarantee it, but whenever I've chosen "No Preference", we have always gotten seats together.

Thanks, WT.

Perhaps the seat assignments will be different for the train I'm planning to book. I'll see what options are given then. If they still appear to be separate, I'll just go for the No preference choice.

You may even want to check Raileurope in U.S. as they have a 50% off sale on Thalys regular fares for travel thru the end of August - for personal service i always recommend BETS, a RailEurope agent 800-441-2387; www.budgeteuropetravel.com for their expertise - you will at least be certain of the seating. But check both voyages-sncf.com and thalys.com and raileurope IMO

PalQ - the 50% off summer sale is only valid until end of August. My trip takes place in mid-Sept. thanks for the reminder though.

UPDATE:

Bought the Thalys tickets this morning for Sept 16 travel. We actually need to go to Bruges instead of Brussels, and it turns out there are direct Thalys trains that run between the 2.

I tried picking Sq and Kiosk and were given separate seats.

When I retried with "no preference", we were given side-by-side seats. Go figure.

Paris-Lille-Bruges is nearly just as fast as doing the Thalys via Brussels and often a lot cheaper - fairly flat fare you can just show up and buy - not the Byzantine fare structure of Thalys

That said if you got a good fare on the daily thalys Paris-Bruges train all the better - but since it runs at odd hours i believe most will find the Paris-Lille-Bruges route a loss less hard to get a good fare on.

Hi PalenQ -

I started a new thread about my train tix buying experience.

For our purpose, the Paris-Lille-Bruges would have taken at least an extra hour longer, and just the Paris-Lille TGV leg alone is €20pp (PREMs).

I was able to book the direct Paris-Bruges on a SMOOVE fare for €25pp.

yk - Paris to Bruges for $40 - outstanding!

The original aisle seats (62 and 66, for example) are not across the aisle from each other, but face each other over a small table.

If your seats are in carriage 8,18, or 28, seats #22 and #26 face each other as a part of 2x2 configuration.

http://tinyurl.com/4qrx5u

Seat numbering on some of these trains does not follow a sequential pattern. Used to be a site where you could view some train car configurations but I don't know it anymore....

PQ
I bought a ticket through RailEurope Amsterdam -Paris for 43 dollars (although it was three months prior the trip)
They charge for the delivery , but it is still a good deal.

Yes with the summer Thalys sale Rail Europe can be more competitive on Thalys than usual and the bit extra money it seems may be well worth the many hassles folks report from trying to book online thru sncf or thalys sites. I recommend BETS for their expertise and also they do not charge RE's $18 mailing fee i believe.

yk - though you bought your ticket you say the Thalys 50% off thru RailEurope is only good thru the end of August but i read that you must buy the ticket by Sep 17 and complete travel by the end of Sep - not sure which one is right.