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Meeting Your Trip in LIBOURNE
This page offers help (concrete or informational) on reaching your trip. Topics include...
- Where you Join Your Trip (see immediately below)
- Our “Access Packages,” designed to help you to do so.
- Suggestions on how to time your trip to the trip, whether you are having us arrange your travel, or doing it yourself.
- Service information regarding train travel to your trip start location.
- Suggested pre-trip visits, especially when these are not geographically obvious, but are rendered economical and convenient by direct rail connections.
- Hopefully helpful hints for those setting up their own travel to the trip.
If you wish to arrange some or all of your travel through us, please tell us what by means of this response questionnaire, designed to collect all the information we need to be able to book your travel.
1. WHERE and WHEN Do You Join Your Trip?
Your trip assembles at the Libourne train station, on the afternoon of its start date (generally a Saturday), in time for the short (7-mile) cycle to St.-Emilion, our home for two nights. A first meet takes place in early afternoon (2p), and a second, for late arrivals (and by prior arrangement only), at 6p.
If you are arriving via an intercontinental flight, know that service direct from the airport to Libourne is spotty. Between the two, you must go downtown (or to another suburban station) to catch a train on an alternate route. Either is a hassle: the airport train does not run directly to the downtown station (Gare Montparnasse). While it does run to the other suburban station, who wants to sit on a crowded commuter train for an hour?
We will send you details of meeting time and place with your final itinerary.
If you wish to make your own way to the trip (in other words, not to set up your travel arrangements through us), a couple of hints on getting there are offered at the bottom of this page.
2. Our ACCESS PACKAGES
as of April 15, 2010 (2nd edition, updated with summer schedules)
The closest intercontinental airport is Paris. Our “Access Package” includes a TGV (high-speed train) ticket from Charles de Gaulle airport or from downtown Paris to Libourne. Friday overnight trains from Nice, Madrid, Barcelona or Lisbon are available at additional cost, if you are coming from the south.
Our London “Access Package” includes a train through from London on the trip's start date.
Base (Starting) Access Package Price: 59€.
To see what this means in your currency, look here: http://www.bluemarble.org/CurrencyConv.html
“Ride the Bike Train” discount fare: 29€.
Availability is not guaranteed, as our packages use discount fare codes which have restricted space. If your requested train does not have the discount fare, we will attempt to propose an alternate schedule that does, as well as a price for your first choice service. Some extra-cost options also have higher prices if ordered w/in 35 days.
Included:
- 2nd cl. daylight train tickets to Libourne from Paris or Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport.
Tickets are not refundable or exchangeable once ordered. See below for extra cost of more flexible tickets. - Seat reservations on the TGV (high-speed train).
- A printed schedule / itinerary, highlighting any connections.
- Our “Route Sheet to the Trip,” helping you through your journey.
“Ride the Bike Train Discount”
If you are willing to take the cycle train down (depart Paris Saturday morning at 8a), tickets may be available for 29€.
The cycle train adds 2 hours to the journey.
Options Offered at an Extra Cost (subject to availability)
Prices are in addition to the “Base” Access Package price.
For a general discussion of train upgrades, see here. Topics include the relative comfort of first versus second class, and different types of accommodation available on overnight trains.
- Tickets from London. Add 69€ if you are also purchasing tickets back to London, 109€ if not, or if you prefer a changeable return (in 1st class, add 109€ or 149€; 1st class tickets include meal service between London and Lille or Paris).
A Paris stop-over is available for an additional 10€.
- First class train tickets (in lieu of 2nd class): +19€ discount rate.
Not refundable or exchangeable: see below for additional cost of exchangeable tickets.
- Exchangeable tickets: +14 or 25€ 2nd class, +22 or 35€ 1st class.
Tickets are exchangeable locally, on a space-available basis. An additional charge may apply upon exchange if the discount fare used to purchase the tickets is in a “fare bucket” no longer available on the next departing train, but at least you recover the funds invested in the original ticket.
The lower price corresponds to a ticket that must be exchanged before the train’s departure, and carries a change fee of 10€, paid directly to the railway.
The higher price corresponds to tickets that can be used even if the initial reservation is not canceled before the train departs, for a nominal fee paid directly to the railway (generally 3€).
All
tickets can be exchanged through us for +10€, but must be physically returned to the office of the country in which they were issued, and a new shipping charge may apply.
These tickets are also refundable less 20%. In order to obtain a refund, the lower-priced flexible tickets must be canceled before departure, the higher priced ones within a week of departure.
- Paris airport train tickets, from Charles de Gaulle or Orly to Paris center. Follow this link for details.
Alternate Arrangements, in lieu of our usual packages (subject to availability)
Prices are complete (in other words, they are not in addition to the “Base” Access Package Price)
- Friday overnight train from Nice, Madrid, Barcelona, or Lisbon, including a couchette: 79€ from Nice (discount rate of 59€ sometimes available), 129€ from Spain, 149€ from Lisbon.
Upgrades are available: from Nice, to “Comfort Couchette.” From Spain or Portugal: to private single and double cabin sleeping cars, regular or deluxe. Regular upgrade rates apply.
3. TIMING Your Trip
The Saturday afternoon bike ride is short, but fun, and it allows you to reach St.-Emilion in time to explore. If at all possible, try to schedule your arrival in Libourne for the early (2p) meeting.
Saturday is market day in Libourne, and the market is fun. So taking the early train down from Paris is an agreeable option. However, there is no place to leave your luggage at the Libourne station. Solution: pick a restaurant, tell the proprietor that you are returning for lunch, and deposit your luggage there while you walk around and gawk at the geese.
Like airplanes, trains to Libourne require reservations. You must not only tell us by which gateway you wish to arrive, but at what time of day you wish to travel.
Connecting from a Flight
The railroad does not assume responsibility for (chronically) late planes. Moreover, it can take intercontinental travellers up to 90 minutes to clear customs, immigration and baggage claim upon arrival. If you are attempting a tight connection, we suggest modifiable tickets. If your plane is delayed, and your ticket is not modifiable, you will need to buy a new one at full fare.
4. Service Information
Schedules are approximate – exact timetables can be consulted at
http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/point_to_point/triprequest.htm.
Best trains are mentioned. Others are slower or have multiple connections.
- From downtown Paris. Travel time is 3 hours. There are direct trains at 7:45a and 10:50a, and a train with a connection at 2:10p.
The cycle train (for the “ride the bike train” special price) departs at 8a.
Either of the direct trains reach Libourne in time for the early trip meeting.
The trip timed to reach Libourne for the late meeting departs Paris at 2p.
- From Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport. Travel time is 4 hours. A direct train operates at 1:40p.
This schedule may change, and we will make sure it hasn't before we book if you know your flight times. Traditionally, two morning trains also ran, but they disappeared with the summer 2010 schedule, we aren't sure why (they always seemed well-used).
- From Nice. Overnight service with a morning connection in Bordeaux.
- From Barcelona, Madrid, Lisbon. Overnight sleeper services depart their respective cities in the evening (5p from Lisbon), with connections in the morning to Libourne.
- From London. 6:30a via Paris (with a station change), arrive 2p. Or 10a via Lille, arrive 5:30p.
Includes a one-hour time change, actual trip is an hour shorter.
5. Suggested PRE-TRIP VISITS
Spain, Portugal, the south of France....
6. Hints on TRAVELLING INDEPENDENTLY to the Trip
Guests subscribing to an “Access Package” need not read this section.
See also “Timing Your Trip” and “Service Information,” above, as either of these may additionally help.
We gladly provide travel consulting (schedule or routing information) concerning pre-trip individual travel. In particular, we have invested a great deal to become railway experts. Our service fees are reasonable: a 20€ charge for all but the most complex projects – or the most simple (for instance, only a 10€ charge applies if the service is limited to the preparation of a routine rail ticket). You will generally find them well-justified by the time they will save you in research, standing on line, overpaying for your tickets, or all three.
But, for some, this type of research is fun. So, here are some hints, intended to start off hardened “do-it-yourselfers.”
Trains. Schedules for all routes can be consulted on this web site:
http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/point_to_point/triprequest.htm
Libourne is a minor stop on the Paris - Bordeaux main line (see service notes, above, for approximate schedules). Main line trains also run from across the south of France to Bordeaux, a 30-minute trip from Libourne by frequent local train. Overnight sleeper trains come from southeastern France, Spain, and Portugal (the last with morning connections at the Franch border).
Planes. The closest airport is Bordeaux, which offers European flights. Trains from Bordeaux to Libourne run hourly (though on an irregular schedule), and trip time is 30 minutes.
It is generally quicker, and always more comfortable and more reliable, to train from Paris Charles de Gaulle airport to Libourne rather than catching a connecting flight to Bordeaux and training from there.
At this writing, Ryanair serves Bergerac, Poitiers and Limoges (in order of convenience), all less than 2 hours from Libourne by train (train service is roughly every 2 hours on all routes, journey times range from 1 to 2 hours).
If you wish to arrange some or all of your travel through us, please tell us what by means of this response questionnaire, designed to collect all the information we need to be able to book your travel.
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