Thanks for the advice. I haven't yet booked the AF flight yet so it sounds like I need to find an alternative. I need to be in CGN (Bonn actually) for a meeting in the early afternoon, so I'm trying to find the best option. The next AF flight leaves at 1:05 PM.

I've looked at taking the train from CDG to CGN, but it also departs at 7:45 AM so I don't know if that's any better (next train leaves at 10 AM and takes 5 hours so that doesn't work).