Train from London to Ardeche - advice please!

Seaxwyn

My daughter has been invited to join friends for a holiday near Pierrelatte in the Ardeche. She will need to travel by train. I'm looking for a trip that is the best compromise between simplicity, speed and cheapness.

She is 18 and a student.

Advice very welcome,thanks!

peachyprice

What dates is she going? This makes a huge difference and does it have to be by train, Ryan Air or Easy Jet to Marseille would be a lot cheaper than Eurostar

angelil

^^ Not necessarily; if you book far enough in advance the Eurostar can be very cheap at around £60 return for students (although the OP doesn't state the dates of travel so we can't know what would be cheaper).

OP, Pierrelatte has its own station. However, to get to this station involves changing trains twice, resulting in a journey that looks like this:
PARIS GARE DE LYON -> AVIGNON TGV -> AVIGNON CENTRE -> PIERRELATTE

As you can imagine, all of these changes are a PITA and would extend your daughter's journey to about 4.5 hours just from Paris (so not including the train/s she'd need to get from the UK to France). At its cheapest, the journey between Paris and Pierrelatte is about €80 return.

However, I wouldn't recommend going all the way to Pierrelatte. Working on the assumption that the parents of your daughter's friend have a car, I would just get the fast train from Paris to Avignon if I were her and have them collect her there. Definitely quicker (about 3 hours) and only slightly more expensive at €90 return. I'll be doing the same this October when I visit my aunt - rather than taking lods of piddly connecting trains to her nearest station (in the Ardeche's neighbouring department, the Gard), she'll be collecting me from Avignon. Avignon is a lovely place with loads to do and see, so the family could make a day of it to make their drive there worthwhile.

Hope this helps a bit; my inlaws live in the Ardeche so I know the area. Let me know if I can help further

mcfisco

Seat 61 is your friend here

http://www.seat61.com/

peachyprice

angelil wrote: »

^^ Not necessarily; if you book far enough in advance the Eurostar can be very cheap at around £60 return for students (although the OP doesn't state the dates of travel so we can't know what would be cheaper).

Erm, yes, that's why I said the dates make a huge difference. As there's only 5 weeks of the summer hols left I'd say booking far enough in advance to get a £60 seat is pretty unlikely as there aren't any available in August, at all.

Seaxwyn

Thanks everyone. She needs to travel out on 4 August and back on 9th or 10th. So it's very short notice. She'd much rather travel by train than plane if possible.

angelil, thanks for the very useful information. Her friends will have a car and can pick her up. It looks as if Montelimar is nearer than Avignon to Pierrelatte.

richardw

Btw there are direct trains from Lyon LYS airport to Montelimar. The station at the airport is Lyon St Exupery TGV.

This http://www.tgv-europe.com/en/ website has tkts priced in Euros, which can be cheaper.

Where are you in the UK?