Paris Day Trips: 7 Days Beyond the City
Seven days based in Paris, seven different day trips, seven return train or RER rides each night to your own bed. This plan skips the city sights entirely (see our Paris itinerary for that) and covers the full gateway roster instead: Versailles, Disneyland Paris, Giverny, Reims, Fontainebleau, Chartres, and the D-Day beaches around Bayeux. Shorter on time? The 2-day , 4-day , and 5-day versions of this itinerary use the same first days, just fewer of them.
Book these before you go
- Versailles Palace timed slot (Day 1) - mandatory even for free-admission visitors, book on chateauversailles.fr before anything else on this list.
- Disneyland Paris dated park ticket (Day 2) - book online for the lower advance price tier; gate prices on a summer Saturday run far higher.
- Reims/Champagne house tour (Day 4) - a guided Champagne day tour needs booking weeks ahead in summer.
- Bayeux D-Day beaches tour (Day 7) - book your Saint-Lazare train and a D-Day beaches tour together if you’re doing it as a single day.
The week at a glance
| Day | Day trip | Travel time from Paris | One-way transport |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Versailles | 35-40 min | RER C |
| 2 | Disneyland Paris | 35-40 min | RER A |
| 3 | Giverny (seasonal) | 45 min + shuttle | Train to Vernon + Le Petit Train |
| 4 | Reims/Champagne | 45 min | TGV |
| 5 | Fontainebleau | 40 min | Transilien R |
| 6 | Chartres | 1 hr | TER |
| 7 | D-Day beaches/Bayeux | 2h18-2h30 | Direct train |
Day 1: Versailles
Take RER C to Versailles Château Rive Gauche (check current schedules on iledefrance-mobilites.fr ) and walk the 8-10 minutes to the gates. The Palace-only ticket is EUR21; the Passport with the Trianon estate and gardens is EUR25 in low season, EUR35 in high season. Your timed Palace slot applies even if you’re visiting free (under-18, EU resident under 26), so arrive within your booked half hour. The Palace is closed Mondays, so if this is your Monday, swap with Day 6 (Chartres, gardens-only Versailles visits, or a free-roaming day in central Paris also work). Go straight to the Palace interior at opening; the gardens stay open until dusk and thin out by late afternoon.
Day 2: Disneyland Paris
RER A direct from Châtelet-Les Halles takes 35-40 minutes to Marne-la-Vallée-Chessy. A 1-Park 1-Day ticket booked in advance starts around EUR56-62; a 2-Park ticket bought at the gate on a peak day can top EUR130. Disney Adventure World, the March 2026 relaunch of the former Walt Disney Studios Park, added World of Frozen to the existing Avengers Campus, and Pirates of the Caribbean in the original Disneyland Park is still the best ride in the resort. The RER fare is never bundled with the park ticket, so buy them separately.
Day 3: Giverny
Only open late March through early November, so check the calendar before locking this day in; swap in a second Fontainebleau-style rest day if you’re travelling in winter. Train from Gare Saint-Lazare to Vernon takes about 45 minutes (roughly EUR15 second class), then the seasonal shuttle (EUR5 one-way) or a EUR20 taxi covers the last stretch to Monet’s garden. Admission is about EUR13. Late spring is the most crowded window for the flowers, so take an early train if you’re going April through June.
Day 4: Reims and the Champagne houses
TGV from Gare de l’Est to Reims takes about 45 minutes, fares from EUR18 to EUR75 depending on how far ahead you book (check sncf-connect.com directly). Budget EUR180-250 for the full day once you add the cathedral, one or two house tours, and lunch. House tours need advance booking, especially in summer, so this is not a walk-up tasting day. Épernay’s Avenue de Champagne is worth the extra stop if Reims alone feels light.
Day 5: Fontainebleau
Transilien R from Gare de Lyon takes about 40 minutes; the chateau itself costs EUR14 while the gardens are free. It draws a fraction of Versailles’s crowds and has fewer showpiece state rooms, which is exactly the point after four days of bigger sights. A short bus from the station covers the last stretch to the chateau, or it’s a walkable if longer distance.
Day 6: Chartres
TER from Montparnasse runs about an hour, roughly 18 trains a day, one-way fares from EUR12. The cathedral is free to enter and about a 10-minute walk from the station. The town itself is small, so treat this as a half-day at the cathedral plus a relaxed lunch rather than a full day of varied sights.
Day 7: The D-Day beaches, Bayeux
Direct trains from Paris Saint-Lazare reach Bayeux in as little as 2h18, about 8 a day, second class from EUR15. Bayeux is the practical base for guided tours covering Utah Beach, Omaha Beach, Pointe du Hoc, and the American Cemetery, roughly 20 minutes away by road. An early train out and a late one back makes this workable as a single very long day, but if your schedule has any give, swap it for an overnight in Bayeux instead so you’re not clock-watching at the cemetery. The Bayeux Tapestry Museum is closed for renovation until October 2027, with the tapestry on loan to the British Museum, so don’t build this day around seeing it.
Should you add Mont-Saint-Michel to this week?
Not as an eighth day trip. It’s 4 to 4.5 hours each way from Paris (or about 3.5 hours via TGV to Rennes plus a bus, faster but with a transfer), and there’s no direct train. If you have two extra days beyond this itinerary, spend them as an overnight at Mont-Saint-Michel or a base in Saint-Malo, not as a same-day round trip bolted onto this week.
Is a week of day trips better than splitting time between Paris and other cities?
For a first visit, yes, because you keep one hotel for the whole week and never repack. Everything on this list returns to Paris the same evening except the honest exception, Day 7, which works better as an overnight if you can spare it. A week of one-way city hops trades that convenience for more time in each place, which suits a second or third visit more than a first one.
Book one hotel near Châtelet-Les Halles or Saint-Michel Notre-Dame for the whole week; both sit on multiple RER lines, so none of these seven mornings starts with an extra Metro transfer.