So I am choosing my tickets for my trip to Greece this summer. One affordable choice is Air France. The planes change in Paris(CDG) with a 10 hour and 45 minute delay in between planes. Is this enough time for me to leave the airport, see a few things, and get back without missing my plane back to America?
How far is the airport from the city? Is there convenient metro? What, realistically, can I see in such a small time-frame?
thanks for your help...
ciao,
Anton
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Depending on how much time you need to check-in for you flight back - yes, it will be possible to get a small sample of Paris.
Quickest way in and out of Paris is with the train called RER B.
If you land in CDG terminal 1 you take the elevator down to %26quot;niveau départ%26quot; (ground floor) find exit 22 and take the airportbus %26quot;navette%26quot; line 2 to RER-station CDG 1. Here you buy a ticket to Paris (8 euros) and take the first train (leaves every 10-15 minutes). The ride to Saint-Michel right beside the Notre-Dame cathedral is about 40 minutes.
If you land in CDG terminal 2 the train station is in the same building - just follow the signs %26quot;Paris par train%26quot;.
Same ticket procedure as above.
If you land in CDG 3 you leave the terminal, take a right turn, follow the signs %26quot;Paris par train%26quot; - it is a walk of about 7-8 minutes. Follow the pedestrian path, under a tunnel, and you come to the RER-station CDG 1. Same ticket procedure.
All in all you should be in mid-town Paris in an hour.
That should leave you time enough for Notre Dame, Ile de la Cité, Ile St.Louis, Eiffel Tower, Arc de Triomphe, Champs Elysées, Place de la Concorde and the Louvre (only from the outside).
I would start with the Notre Dame and the 2 islands in the Seine. Then take a taxi from Saint-Michel to the Eiffel Tower (don%26#39;t go up !).
Cross the bridge Pont d%26#39;iéna, go up to the Trocadéro. Take the metro line 6 up to the Arc de Triomphe (Charles de Gaulle Étoile), stroll down the Champs Élysées for as long as you like. If you get tired before the Place de la Concorde, hop down in the metro e.g. at Franklin D.Roosevelt and go to Concorde.
Get off and go into the gardens Jardins des Tuileries, walk through the park up to the Louvre (don%26#39;t go in !) - enjoy the palace from the outside. Cross the river at Pont Neuf - have a few glasses of top-class wine at the wine bar %26quot;Henri IV%26quot; at the Place du Pont Neuf - follow the south side of the island to Pont Saint Michel - and spend the rest of the time strolling around in the part of the Latin quarter that is closest to the river (and RER St.Michel).
Catch the RER B back to Aéroport Charles de Galle about 1½ hours before your check-in time.
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Assuming you will be checked through to NYC and won%26#39;t have any luggage to worry about, a ten hour layover should comfortably give you seven hours in the center of Paris. That gives you 45 minutes each way to get to and from the center via the RER, and 90 minutes to find your way comfortably to your onward flight in time for boarding.
What you might do with that time depends really on what you want to do. If you really just want to see the %26quot;sights%26quot; then perhaps the best thing would be to take a two hour L%26#39;Open Bus tour, which will let you see all the major ones from the outside. Then you could pick one or two to visit, though I%26#39;d suggest that you avoid the ones with long lines, such as the Eiffel Tower.
Alternatively if you are art lovers, you could spend a good bit of your time on a decent visit to one of the major museums, or perhaps two of the smaller ones.
Or you could just pick one or two areas - perhaps the islands and either the Marais or the Latin Quarter, and read up on them and then just spend your time visiting those areas and checking out the architecture, the cafés, the visible history and so on.
A delicious (not necessarily expensive) lunch and a glass of good wine wouldn%26#39;t be a bad thing either.
And a relaxing one hour trip on the Seine is always a delight if the weather is right.
Obviously you can%26#39;t do all of these so you need to decide what it is you want to do. The one thing I urge you to do is not to try to do too much. Do one or two things in a relaxed manner rather than four or five in a mad rush and I think you%26#39;ll enjoy your brief visit much more.
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