TGV tickets - time to buy, but where/how?

It is time for me to purchase our train tickets for our upcoming trip to France. We will be taking the TGV train from Rennes to Paris.

Does anyone know of a website that someone from the US can use to purchase the tickets at a reasonable rate?

Thanks

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You can get train times and costs, and make bookings, at www.tgv-europe.com/en but say you are from Great Britain. If you say you are from USA, you get another site that has much higher prices.

Say you want to pick up the tickets in France. You will be given a reference number. You can then get the tickets at any SNCF (mainline) station or an SNCF boutique by quoting the reference and producing the *exact* same card that you used for the booking.

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Also, at that TGV site you might even have the option of printing your tickets at home - in fact it might be the only option. If not, you can pick them up at the station, but you must have with you your confirmation number and the credit card you used to purchase the tickets.

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Rail Europe. 60 days before ticket is needed.

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Just bought TGV tickets for Dijon/Paris 26/9 from this official site. Good price, easy procedure printed the tickets off and have them in my hot little hand and I live in Melbourne, Australia. A fantastic service. Don%26#39;t go to Raileurope as they will probably be more expensive. http://www.tgv.com/EN/index_HD.html

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Don%26#39;t use RailEurope unless you have money to burn. It charges a substantial fee on top of the actual ticket costs, and often lists only the more expensive trains.

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I just bough our tickets Paris-Lourdes from www.sncf-voyages.com 90 days ahead of our travel day.The site is easy to follow or you may open another window with a tralation site such as iGoogle to translate the key words. I found that if I need to buy a return ticket (in my case:Paris-Lourdes-Paris) I have to buy 1 way first for our PREM, and few days later when it suitable with my return date I buy the one way PREM ticket for the return leg. My ticket cost me 120E for 3 persons on first class - and 66E for 3 on second class on the return (PREM first class is available on our departure time but as much as more than 2 times higher than the previous leg tickets)

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The only tickets you can print yourself are the %26quot;prem%26quot; fares (deepest discount). All others, you will need to print out your confirmation number and, as noted above take the SAME credit card you used for purchase, to the SNCF boutique or a ticket window at a train station to get the actual tickets.

If you can get prem fares only one direction when you are traveling both ways, book as two separate trips (the cost does not increase, but you will at least be able to print the one where you got the %26quot;prem%26quot; fare (otherwise, you won%26#39;t be able to print any of it because you can%26#39;t print all of it, if that makes sense).

Once you get used to it, it%26#39;s not really difficult. I agree with the observation above, however, don%26#39;t use Eurail or similar (and don%26#39;t say you are from the US - as noted above, say you will receive the tickets in France) or you will pay a great deal more. I was too chicken to do my own until a friend showed me how easy it was (and also, no small thing, how much less she paid for her seat on the same train).

Have fun!

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Thank you all very much. In reading the many posts on this subject, I had heard about everyone getting better rates than via Rail Europe, but was not able to find them. I%26#39;ll follow the information provided and get my tickets this way.

I%26#39;ve not heard of %26#39;Prem%26#39; fares. Can you tell me what that is? We are doing one-way tickets.

Thanks again, I appreciate it.

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We%26#39;ve always bought our TGV tickets at the time we%26#39;ve needed them. It worked well for us when our flight was 4.5 hours late. Is this a bad way to do it? Seems less stressful than trying to beat the online system by lying about your country and remembering your credit card. There have always been seats/trains available, but we%26#39;ve never done an overnight train, maybe that%26#39;s different. But, maybe I%26#39;m naive...what are good reasons for buying tickets in advance?

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Is there a reason to buy PREMS tickets? Only if you want to save alot of money. Also, use MorganB%26#39;s directions, go through the SNCF site in English, making notes about each step, but stopping before you must pay. Then go back, do it in French and just print your ticket on your computer. Then compare prices!! For me, a PREMS ticket from CDG to Avignon on the English language site was 120 euros, 2nd class. On the French site, same train, same class, I paid 60 Euros going down. My second ticket a week later going from Avignon to Gare St. Lazare was 42 Euros! To me, it was more than worth the small effort it took.