ParisByTrain.com

[ehyche]

Hi Ben,

Thanks for the great site - very informative.

Our family of four (my wife and I, plus two daughters ages 14 and 11) will be arriving in Paris this coming Thursday morning May 28th 2009 at CDG, and departing on the Eurostar to London the following Tuesday June 2nd. We are staying in the Rue Clare area and will be spending pretty much all of those days in Central Paris, except for 1 day. On that day, my wife and younger daughter will go to Disneyland Paris, and my older daughter and I will go to Versailles. We almost certainly will be riding the Metro at least twice a day.

I can tell from reading your site that the Passe Navigo is not going to be the best option because of the timing of our arrival (Thursday versus the beginning of the week). However, what's still unclear to me is whether it would be better to buy 5-day Visite cards, or just buy carnets as needed. Which would be the better deal?

Also, whichever way we go (carnet or Visite), it sounds like we should just buy for the inner zones and supplement this with single-ride tickets for the RER from CDG and to/from Disneyland and Versailles? Can you confirm this?

Thanks very much for your help!

Eric

[ben]

Hi Ehyche,

If you plan to make more than 4 trips on public transportation per day, then it makes sense to buy an unlimited ride pass, whether that be the Paris Visite, Ticket Mobilis, or Navigo Découverte. Otherwise, single Metro tickets bought as carnet are the cheapest, most flexible alternative.

If you're only making a single trip out to areas in zones 3-6, purchasing single ride RER tickets (billet Ile-de-France) to cover your trips out to Paris Disneyland or Versailles is cheaper than including those zones in your Metro/RER pass.

Ben