Sorry. not sure if my message was posted. Does anyone know how to determine which seats are facing forward on a first class TGV car. I'm headed from CDG to Avignon and would like two seats side by side facing forward. I've searched, but can't find this info on the SNCF site. Thank you!

Your best bet is to call the SNCF English line and request forward-facing seats, and be sure to ask about any discounts that might apply for two people traveling together.

Thank you. Yes, calling is a good idea. It's easy to forget about the telephone when we have the internet.

Hi PB,

There is no way of knowing which seats face forward in any given car.

Trains go into stations one way and out the other way.

Sometimes a seat faces forward and sometimes it faces backward.

We've been able to specify seats facing forward--has this changed?

One way to deal with this, if you are travelling with someone else who doesn't mind facing backward, is to reserve "vis a vis" (face to face) seats. This is also effective when the route includes a turn around station, such as Marseille. One seat is always facing forward.
Unlike local trains or buses, TGV, once attained crusing speed, you cannot feel which way the train is going, unless it is the forward view you are looking for. There is not much to see on this route,however, farm/village/expressway/farm/village/expressway...

> We've been able to specify seats facing forward ...

Yes, if you reserve with an operator, they can tell you what seats are available and you can specify your wish. (You cannot do this with online reservation). This usually works. However is not 100%. Once I had reserved a forward seat at a station(the operator even showed me the seat map of tha car but when I got on the TGV train, I realized they had put a different type of train so my seat was facing backward. Other times, it worked.

The TGV seems to have three basic arrangements for seats in first class: Club 4, which is a semi private "stall" where you have two seats facing two seats with a table in between. Like Greg said, the hedge bet is to request a seat across from one another so that no matter which way the train goes, you always have one facing foward.

The second option is called Duo, which is seats side by side facing the same way. Whether they head forward or not is anyones guess like Ira said. Each passenger has a flop down table ie the airline style.

The third option seems to be one seat facing the other, but not in conjunction with any other passengers so both people have windows. Not sure what this option is called but it includes a table.

We liked any first class seat we had. Good luck.

Sometimes they can tell what seats face forward (sens de la marche) and sometimes they cant. They used to have an option on first class seats online where you could chose sens de la marche on certain trains. Havent seen it in a while though. Calling is the best option if you must have those seats but you are excluding yourself from prem fares if you do that.