If you did not validate your ticket, you can get a refund. Even if you did validate your ticket, in many cases you can get a refund just by saying that after you validated, it was impossible to board the train (which is very true in many cases).

I received this message automatically from the SNCF since I had bought my ticket over the internet:

<I>Vous pouvez vous faire rembourser intégralement votre billet sans frais quel que soit votre tarif, y compris pour les tarifs non échangeables, non remboursables. Le remboursement est possible en gare, boutique SNCF ou dans votre agence de voyage agréée SNCF et ce jusqu'à 60 jours après votre date de voyage.</I>

If you write to them, there is a customer service address to which you send your sad tale and proof of purchase.

Our train from Paris to Nimes ran, but people sat on floor, on steps, 3 sharing 2 seats, and even saw person sitting in WC, on 6/14. For son and family same train ran on 6/16. Today, however, our daughter and family's train from CDG was cancelled so they took RER to Gare de Lyon & boarded train there for Nimes. For all of us it worked out ok eventually but do feel sorry for those who have had more of a struggle, including French students taking the Bac yesterday.

Mary et al
I think we will wait until Thursday to see what might come out of the union meetings. Hopefully there will be enough detail to make an informed decision. If for example the strike is set for the afternoon or evening, things should be OK for landing in the morning. If the strike schedule does affect our flight then I assume the airline will be able to make some suggestions at that time. Don't know if that is a good plan or not but there just seems to be too many unknowns to make a big change in our travel plans.

Thanks, kerouac. I don't think we validated anything since I had the PDF printouts and no one ever came by with a machine to read the code. I've got all of my email confirmations so I'll try writing and see what happens.

This new air traffic controller strike is another issue. My dad is supposed to fly to London from Orly on the 27th and with all the unknowns he decided to see if he could change his ticket to fly home directly from Paris. We were able to do that but he has to leave on the 26th. He's fine as he has been to Paris a couple other times and we are doing a lot of repeat sites with my sister and her husband.

What a trip this has been. Strikes and the scariest roads I have ever driven. I broke down and bought a bottle of grocery store wine to have with dinner last night. I don't even like wine.

Is trvlgirlmq feeling that her entitlement license has been violated?

"Are we being fleeced . . . ?"

How often have I been stranded overnight on business travel in the US?

How about standing up all the way from Philadelphia to Penn Station on Amtrak? All night.

Stuff happens. Get over it. Even relax and enjoy the rest of your trip.

The rail strike has entered another day; perhaps something will happen on Thursday.

Ackislander asks <b>"Is trvlgirlmq feeling that her entitlement license has been violated?"</b>

Give the woman a break. She's traveling with 3 kids and wasted 9 hours getting the run-around at the train station. What a stupid comment.

<b>"Are we being fleeced . . . ?" (she asked)</b>

You can see how she might think that if the French speakers are getting a refund and she's told she isn't.

The "scolds" must feel a need to appear. So sorry trvlgirl for your plight w three children.

Am I the only one who is going to google for the latest updates and then posting them here? That's getting just a little old so I'll bid you all the best and sign off this thread.

Most people here don't seem to know how to Google.

Wow the nerve of some people. Yeah I do feel entitled to the service for which I paid. This was a huge trip for 3 generations of my family to celebrate my birthday ( I spent it on the floor of the train station by the way), my mom's birthday and my oldest child's HS graduation. We chose to spend our thousands of dollars here and it has not been the most relaxing with having to worry about all of our travel plans.

I appreciate the updates here and I am also checking the SNCF website when I can get service on my phone.

The main thing in which to believe is the right to strike unless you wish to live in a totalitarian dictatorship. Yes, it can be inconvenient sometimes.

Glad I got back to the U.S. From France before these strikes began. Yes, they DO have the right to strike, but travelers spending thousands of $ to visit their lovely country also have the right to complain about being inconvenienced! Maybe without some of the many $$$$ received from tourism, and going into their economy, these strikers might not have a job at all. The French seem to carry this "striking" business to the extreme. Of course not all French people have this strike mentality. Thank goodness.