Hey everyone,
Whats the best way to book a ticket for the overnight train from Paris to Florence if your not living in Europe ? I read on the http://www.voyages-sncf.com that you must be a resident of europe (or at least a resident of the countries listed). Im in Japan. Does anyone worry about that ? Its just that I dont want toi have problems when I get to Paris and try to pickup my tickets !!!
Also It says that I should pickup my tickets at least 7 days before the travel date. But I wont be in France until 3 days before - how do most people get around this problem ?
Any advice would be really apprecaited eh - I am worried that the trains over Christmas will book out soon.......and travel agents in Japan say they cant book these tickets !
Cheers,
There are a few exception on sncf site, and Japan is one of them...The best solution, if you know somebody in France, or in a country listed, is to have you ticket sent to this other adress (you can tick this option too) If not, I'am afraid you will have to book on raileurope.com. When trying a mock booking for a Paris/Florence trip (mid november) I got a prem's ticket (sleeper) for 35 euros, same trip on raileurope was at least 169 dollars!
Voyages-sncf.com doesn't ask you where you live, it asks you in which country you'd like to receive tickets.
Would you like to receive your tickets in France, at the station? Sounds good? Then leave 'France' selected, then you can pick up most tickets at the ticket office in Paris. No problem!
Only the very cheapest 'prems' tickets may not be pick-up-able at the station, but they may have changed this, so see what it says at the confirmation stage.
Bookings have just opened (on 11 Oct) for the 9 Dec to 11 Jan period.
To see a step-by-step advice for using www.voyages-sncf.com to book this train (as there's a few quirks!), and to see and understand the different types of couchette and sleeper on this train, see www.seat61.com/Italy.htm</a><BR><BR>A week or two ago I popped down to Italy for a couple of days from London using Eurostar and using these sleeper trains, and thoroughly enjoyed the journey as well as Italy!
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