baxterboy12

Hi, my wife and I are doing London and Paris for a week in August.

Nashville>LHR, August 19/20.
LHR>Paris hotel Aug 20
Paris hotel>London hotel Aug 22
LHR>Nashville Aug 26

We wanted to do open-jaw airfare so we would only have to buy one train ticket, but we couldn't find anything out of Paris so both transATL flights involve London. We are landing at LHR at 6:20AM August 20. Our final destination is Radisson Blu Champs Elysees in Paris, but United did not have award seats available to Paris.

Should we buy a train ticket from LHR to Paris, or buy a separate flight? I have a British Airways 2 for 1 voucher.

If we just have carry-on luggage, how much time should we allow to catch the plane or train?

Would it better logistically/cheaper to hit London first, take the chunnel to Paris, and then take the train from Paris to LHR to fly home?


Thanks for suggestions,

James

Aviatrix

Unless you want to spend time in London at both ends of the trip it would make sense to fly one way... and it would probably make more sense to continue to Paris on your first day because otherwise you'll be spending half a day walking around London bleary-eyed while waiting for the hotel to let you check in. If you carry on to Paris you can hopefully go straight to your hotel, check in and have a rest.

My personal minimum for connections on separate tickets, without checked baggage, is four hours. You can probably do it in less (as you should be able to stay airside), but you want to leave yourselves some leeway.

Swiss Tony

Unfortunately this isn't a great situation to be in.

Either flying or on the train, cheap tickets are inflexible so you're going to have to allow a fair amount of time for the connection or risk having to buy another ticket at the last minute.

Just a thought, but why not base yourself in London and either do a day trip or a one night jaunt to Paris? This would make more of your time as you're not hanging around for connections, which would be dead time.

It also means you can shop around for the cheapest Eurostar tickets.

If that doesn't appeal I'd suggest London first, train to Paris, then flying from Paris back to Heathrow as early as possible on the final day - it's probably going to be a write-off anyway, assuming you're on a flight about 11am or so. You also have a messy terminal connection - into Terminal 4 (Air France) or 5 (BA) then out of T2 on United. BA won't through check your bags onto a separate United ticket, not sure about Air France.

Note that Monday 25th August is a public holiday in the UK, so trains through the tunnel to Paris are likely to be busier/more expensive on the afternoon on Aug 22nd, and also coming back on the afternoon of the 25th.

shawbridge

There is a BA plane from LHR to CDG leaving at 8:40 PM and getting in at 10:50 PM. I have taken it a number of times. So, no need to stop in London unless you want to. Logistically the plane is a lot easier than taking the HEX and a taxi or subway to St. Pancras (though I like the St. Pancras International hotel right at the station). Often, from Boston, BOS-LHR-CDG is less expensive than BOS-LHR.

Yoshi212

If this were my trip I'd want to do Nash>LHR>ORY (I avoid CDG as a rule) leaving at least 2 hours buffer as the flights would be on different PNRs. If going to do train you have to clear immigration+customs at LHR and then travel to St Pancras station.
I would then take the Eurostar from Paris to London and stay a few days and then fly back from LHR to Nashville.

8/19/2014 BNA>LHR
8/20/2014 LHR-ORY
Paris
8/22/2014 Eurostar to London
8/26/2014 London>BNA

I am not a huge fan of France (previous experiences) but I do feel that unless you do a late train on 8/22/2014 you might not have enough time to even see the basics. I would consider doing an earlier train on 8/23/2014 to London instead.

baxterboy12

[QUOTE=

I am not a huge fan of France (previous experiences) but I do feel that unless you do a late train on 8/22/2014 you might not have enough time to even see the basics. I would consider doing an earlier train on 8/23/2014 to London instead.[/QUOTE]


I'm not either. What's to like about mean people, borderline extortionist pricing, and 2nd hand smoke everywhere? But alas, my wife has never been, and the whole world thinks Paris is romantic, so she wants to go.

baxterboy12

Great suggestion on London base camp and 1 night trip to Paris. THANK YOU for the tip about the Holiday in the UK. I wondered why the saver train fares were hard to come by.

baxterboy12

I used United points in first class, and unfortunately they couldn't find 2 award seats to continue on to CDG.

Yoshi212

Enough said, the things we do for love. Happy wife happy life.

exilencfc

I think it's a pretty good idea. London-Paris by Eurostar is easy enough as a day trip and it would also save you hauling bags around Paris.

Otherwise I would go with your original plan of Paris first flying from LHR, probably the easiest thing and also gets round the problem of your early arrival in London. Not sure how long to allow for the transfer, how familiar are you with LHR? I wouldn't want to allow less than 3 hours though.

Swiss Tony

If you do go down this route, do check for packages where you get the train and hotel in Paris bundled together. You might find some bargains on offer (although the holiday weekend could work against you).

Some sites that might help (just check you don't get pushed to a US version - I know expedia doesn't like me going to .com when in the UK)

http://www.eurostar.com/uk-en/eurostar-deals
http://www.expedia.co.uk/p/eurostar-deals
http://www.superbreak.com/travel/eurostar-breaks
http://www.thomascook.com/eurostar/
http://short-breaks.com/eurostar