Meeting Your Trip in DIJON

This page offers help (concrete or informational) on reaching your trip. Topics include...

1. Where you Join Your Trip (see immediately below)
2. Our “Access Packages,” designed to help you to do so.
3. Suggestions on how to time your trip to the trip, whether you are having us arrange your travel, or doing it yourself.
4. Service information regarding train travel to your trip start location.
5. Suggested pre-trip visits, especially when these are not geographically obvious, but are rendered economical and convenient by direct rail connections.
6. 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?

The trip assembles on Sunday morning in Dijon, at our hotel, from 10a. Start time is too early for a same-day intercontinental flight, so you will have to be “landed” in France by the previous day.

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 October 16, 2007

The closest intercontinental airport is Paris. Our “Access Package” includes a Saturday TGV (high-speed train) ticket from Paris, from Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport, or a ticket from Geneva or Lyon. Tickets from London are available at an additional cost. It also includes dinner and the night in Dijon.

Base (Starting) Access Package Price: 82€ double, twin or triple, 93€ single.
Share rate guaranteed to singles willing to share until 35 days prior to trip start.
If you are a North American traveller, the $ price (US or Canadian) on your price chart applies until 35 days prior to trip departure. Otherwise euro prices are transcribed to your invoice in its currency, converted at the exchange rate of the day on which the package is requested (rounded to the nearest whole dollar or pound). Current “mid-market” rates can be consulted from the site we use for conversion. We use the mid-market rate on the day of conversion, and add 2% to cover currency broker exchange commissions (our conversion rates are thus as good as, or better than, any you could obtain, including via your credit card, unless you are a professional currency trader).

Availability is normally guaranteed until 35 days prior to trip start (payment received by us). Within 35 days, availability must be confirmed, and costs may be slightly higher (especially the costs of shipping rail tickets). Some extra-cost options have higher prices if ordered w/in 35 days.

Included:

• 2nd cl. daylight train tickets to Dijon from Paris, Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport (only one daily train — see service information, below), Geneva or Lyon. These tickets are not refundable or exchangeable once ordered – exchangeable tickets are available at a higher fare (see below).
• Seat reservations if your selected train requires them.
• A printed schedule / itinerary, highlighting any connections.
• A hotel night in Dijon.
• Breakfast on Sunday.
• Our “Route Sheet to the Trip,” helping you through your 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 cl., add 99€ or 145€; 1st class tickets include meal service). A Paris stop-over is available at no additional charge, if desired.
  
  
• Tickets from other points.
  All prices include seat reservations on any trains which require them. Tickets are train-specific, generally not refundable or exchangeable once ordered. Extra cost tickets, modifiable or refundable, are available at an additional cost (see below).
  • Nice: add 43€ 2nd class, 71€ 1st class, 51€ 1st class discount rate.
  • Zurich (downtown or airport): add 52€ 2nd class, 89€ 1st class, 65€ 1st class discount rate.
  • Milan: add 62€ 2nd class, 99€ 1st class, 75€ 1st class discount rate.
  • Barcelona: add 75€ 2nd class, 109€ 1st class, 85€ 1st cl. discount rate.

Overnight trains are available from Italy, Austria, Madrid, Berlin... 119€ including a couchette sleeping birth on board (sleeping car upgrades available).

• Higher fare code tickets which are exchangeable locally on a space-available basis and for a nominal fee paid directly to the railway, until your reserved train’s departure time: 23€.
  These tickets are also refundable less 20%, provided that they are cancelled prior to the train’s departure (tickets must be returned to their issuing office for cancellation).
  
  
• First class train tickets (in lieu of 2nd class): 25€ discount rate (not refundable or exchangeable), 49€ regular (exchangeable until train departure time).
  
  
• Saturday night in Paris instead of Dijon, Sunday early morning train to Dijon: + 20€. Share rate guaranteed to singles until 35 days prior to trip start.
  
  
• Paris airport train tickets, from Charles de Gaulle or Orly to Paris center. Follow this link for details.
  
  
• Friday night hotel in Dijon. A room at our usual hotel, including breakfast, taxes, and our booking service, is available for 56€ single, 84€ double or twin. Add 10 € / room if you are not subscribing to the Access Package.

3. TIMING Your Trip

If we may influence your thinking on the topic of timing... Dijon is one of France’s most beautiful cities. And you will not have time to see it on Sunday morning, since we have a full day in the vineyards (you will, however, have another stop here towards the end of the trip).

Still, if you have the flexibility to do so, try to schedule a Saturday arrival, and in time to walk around the old town (the tourist office offers an excellent walking guide). You will enjoy your subsequent visits more for knowing your way around a bit.

Like airplanes, trains to Dijon usually 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. Allow ample time to connect from a flight: the railroad is not responsible 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.


4. Service Information
Schedules are approximate – exact timetables can be consulted at http://www.raileurope.com/us/rail/fares_schedules/index.htm.
Best trains are mentioned. Others are slower or have multiple connections.

• From Paris. Trip time is 90 minutes, service every 90 minutes.
• From Paris’ Charles de Gaulle Airport. Only one daily train, departing the airport at 7:30p (arriving Dijon 9p). If you are landing in the morning, you will prefer to make your way downtown in order to catch an earlier train, and not waste the day at the airport.
• Nice. Travel time 6 hours. A direct train runs at 1:30p. Other services operate at 7a, 10:30a, 3:30p and 4:30p, with a connection in Marseille or Lyon.
• Geneva. Travel time is 4 hours, one change of train required (in either Lausanne or Lyon). Trains via Lausanne depart directly from the airport. Trains via Lyon require that you first take a shuttle train downtown. Regular service is available throughout the day, but most trains require seat reservations (some local trains on the Lyon route can be ridden without seat reservation).
• Zurich: depart 7a, 10a or 4p; 4.5-hour trip. First and last trains are direct. The 10a service is via a connection in Lausanne.
• Milan: depart 9a, arrive 3p. Or, depart 1p, arrive 8p. 1 connection.
• Barcelona. Depart 8:45a, ar. 6p, two connections required.
• From London. Frequent alternate service via Paris; a station change in Paris is required: Gare du Nord to Gare de Lyon. One evening service via Lille (same station connection), dp. London 2:30p, ar. Dijon 9p, including the one-hour time change (trip time is an hour shorter than these times imply)....

5. Suggested PRE-TRIP VISITS

Zermatt, a beautiful Swiss alpine village at the base of the Matterhorn, is a few hours away by train. And, you can couple a visit to Zermatt with a ride on the famous Glacier Express, along the spine of the Alps in a glass-enclosed panoramic 1st class car....


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: 20 € 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/fares_schedules/index.htm

Dijon is served by TGV (high-speed train) from Paris and from the south of France. Main line trains also run from elsewhere in France, Switzerland, Alsace (connections from Germany).... Overnight sleeper trains can bring you from pretty much anywhere in Europe.

Planes. Paris and Lyon have the nearest “real” airports; only the former offers intercontinental flights. Dijon has an airport, but we have never known anyone to successfully use it....


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.