A scenic train journey from London to Geneva via Paris offers some of Europe’s best views – and can cost half the price of a plane ticket at around £135 return
The service trundles through charming towns including Dijon(Image: Aliaksandr Antanovich via Getty Images)
A rail journey linking three capital cities boasts some of Europe’s most breathtaking scenery—and could set you back half the price of a flight.
The Eurostar and France’s TGV whisk passengers from London to Geneva, making the very most of a trip that spans three nations. The train departs from St Pancras with a change in Paris before heading onwards to the Swiss capital.
It’s a nearly six-hour journey in total, passing through Montbard, Dijon and Bourg-en-Bresse, offering stunning vistas of national parks and rolling countryside. Passengers can hop off in Paris to discover the city—with landmarks including the Eiffel Tower, Notre-Dame, the Champs-Élysées, Sacré-Cœur and the Louvre.
Once the train pulls into Geneva, visitors can take in Lake Geneva, Cathédrale de Saint-Pierre, the Palais des Nations, the botanical gardens and the Brunswick Monument.
From there, it’s also a brief trip to the nearby Alps, with day excursions available from the city to ski or snowboard on the slopes and savour the local restaurants. The train can be half the price of a plane ticket. According to Skyscanner, return flights this month cost up to £394.
During the same period, return train tickets cost around £135, half the price of a flight, according to Trainline.
Families can also cut costs by purchasing Interrail passes—£482 for a family of four to travel on four days within one month, plus seat reservation charges. And expense isn’t the sole advantage.
According to the Times, four passengers journeying from London to Geneva and back by rail produce approximately 44kg of carbon emissions, compared with 108kg by car and 1,608kg by plane. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change states that, to maintain climate change within sustainable limits, each person has a carbon “budget” of 1,500kg of carbon emissions per year.
Although there are a number of factors that determine how polluting different forms of travel are, such as the type of electricity production used to power trains, riding the rails is typically greener than flying.
Back in 2023, carbon calculations made by the Rail Delivery Group found that travelling by rail from London to Edinburgh creates 10 times fewer carbon emissions than by car and 13 times fewer than by plane.
One of the tricky considerations for passengers is generally cost, with budget airlines such as Ryanair, easyJet and Wizz Air typically offering cheaper plane tickets than the equivalent train tickets.
The route from London to Geneva shows that it is not always the case. The price gap between the two forms of transport may also be getting smaller.
Travellers are facing rising airfare costs and reductions in flight schedules as the conflict in the Middle East causes oil prices to soar, with concerns that ticket prices could remain elevated for months even if the war de-escalates. Cathay Pacific, AirAsia and Thai Airways are among a growing number of airlines increasing fares to offset the hikes.
While train services are also impacted by rising oil prices, fuel tends to be a much smaller proportion of their operating margins than with airlines.