Trains
WARNING: Reading this entry may give you a headache. We used to have the idea that in France (and Europe generally) one could find a train from anywhere to basically anywhere, roll your bike on, and Bob's Your Uncle. Sure there were difficulties, like stations without elevators, or elevators that are too small, or long trains that pull in and you have no idea where the bike car is, yet it wants to leave in one minute, or conductors that insist you hang your 100 pound loaded bike on a little hook, with five others. Difficult, but still OK.
Maybe that is still true, mostly, but things have become a lot more complicated. In broad terms it's because bikes now mostly need reservations, or their own tickets, because there are many train companies, affiliated with the one SNCF, but not exactly it, and related to that, different classes of trains. And there are regional trains (TER), controlled by Regions, which you need a map to understand and that are subject to change anyway.
Finally there are train booking sites, ranging from SNCF-Connect to Trainline to Omio, each working differently, and importantly, with deranged programmers in the background, hiding from you various trains and schedules and rules that they decide based on circumstances, you do not need to see. (And if you use the desktop version vs the app they feel no obligation to give the same results.)
All of this is still fine, especially compared to Canada, which basically has no trains, and the US, which has (oh my) AMTRAK. But it's fine if you have time, or if you have alternatives. The problem, as with many products and services, comes when you really need it. That's when - watch out!
This time around, it turns out, we really needed it. After whiling away a planned cycling week still at home, we needed to get to outside Paris, and then to Nantes in a single day. We have just come off twelve or maybe twenty four hours devoted to trying to figure it out. We had help from our host near Paris, and from two experienced train-cyclists on Cycleblaze. The issues, when summarized, were not that exactly many: Are there trains from where we start to where we want to go? which ones, exactly? do they take bikes generally? do they have room now? no? what if the bike is disassembled? does the bike need a reservation? reservations? where can you book those? (cause it sure isn't (necessarily)) the same place you booked your ticket(s). Do you have to change stations in Paris (Paris has six main stations)? How long to cycle from one station to the other?
Dealing with these issues would happen mainly in "sncf-connect", the main site of the main company. But navigating within there can be a nightmare, and our friends kept sending us screen shots of stuff we could not reproduce. We could, however, produce results like this:
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In this one simple example we see that only trips with bike "spaces" are shown, which does not mean, even for the case that turns up, that there is actual space. No need to worry about that, because bike space or not, the trip is "not bookable". And anyway, you would get to Nantes when the hotel is closed. No wonder the site helpfully suggests you should think about a bus or car!
You could then start looking for some other work around, except that one or other friend would send a screen shot showing that this trip is bookable. What? Your head begins to spin, but you are only getting going. One of my "favourites" is where a friend sends a screenshot showing some available morning trains. Morning is needed to get the long journey going, but my phone will only show afternoon trains, even though I asked for trips beginning at 9 a.m. It took a while to realize that the cuckoo sncf programmer wanted me to say midnight, because that is the time here, when those 9 am trains in France begin to roll. And this is looking ahead to midnight in a week? The friend, of course, was in France, and did not have the strange aberration.
How does your head feel? Still OK? Well remember how on the screen above they said book the bike space on the "relevant" TER. TER is regional: "Transport Express Régional" and there are 12 regions, or maybe it's 20. TER is for transport within regions, but what if you are crossing regions? And hey, one region is Paris: Isle de France (IDF). See the map - it has helpful live links to the Regions, but what about IDF - no bikes?
OK fine, let's click on one of these TER sites and reserve for our bikes on our train out of Paris on our day:
We need some advice, how about this:
Yes, but with a Non-dismantled bike, maybe we can pay 10 euros and get on some kind of train with it:
We could click o "Book a bicycle Spot" but it does ay don't do that, because this site can not book our type of train (TER). OK, let's stay focused and find out about the Bicycle in a cover. Ah yes, with Bicycle in a Cover we learn the permissible size, however the "Book a bicycle spot" button has disappeared!
Hey now, I only just now while writing this see that the button disappeared because the bicycle became not a bicycle that needs a bicycle reservation but a piece of luggage, that needs a payment, of 5 euros per (non) bicycle. Only thing, I got to this screen having already booked in (but not reserved space for!) two "bicycles". How do I now change them to luggage?
Anyway, in this presentation I haven't tried to be coherent or to follow things sequentially or in detail. That's what took the 24 hours! Here I am just trying to establish the flavour of why my head is buzzing. But let me give a shoutout to Ian Satoor, Carolyn van Hoeve, and Susan Carpenter. Each has a stronger mind than me, and between them Grampies might get to Nantes! As I write this, the plan is still being developed!
Flash! A train has been found that will get us into Paris St Lazare in good time for us to ride through the city to Austerlitz and get a train to Orleans, and then one along the Loire, to Nantes. But look at SNCF-Connect:
I had to tell this thing I wanted to leave at 23:55, to be shown the 8:59 train! There is a programmer in here asleep at the switch!
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2 months ago
2 months ago
2 months ago
2 months ago
For what it’s worth, my experience as a French resident, and regular user of the railway is no different than what is being reported here. I do have available to me work around that those trying to book from out side France don’t have, so I’ll add them here in case you find yourself in France needing a train. First, sncf.connect is the worst when it comes to finding anything that is not a TGV or other long distance train. I use hafas, the Deutschebahn site, in English to string trains together, or I use a travel agent. Not always reliable, but better than the sncf. Second, I argue A LOT with ticket takers. My experience has been that if I can get on the train with my bike, I can get to my destination, rules be damned. Only once did I have to pay the contrôleur anything extra, and it was only €10. This might not work if your French isn’t very good, but it might. I also note that when I know what might work from consulting the internet, I write the trains down and go to a ticket agent and hand them my list. If I have a ticket in hand, and the contrôleur gets upset I can tell him to take it up with management. By selling me a ticket, the sncf is obliged to honor it regardless of whether the ticket agent made a mistake.
Now, things do change, so maybe I’m not completely current, but it’s worth a shot trying some of these strategies.
Cheers,
Keith
2 months ago
2 months ago