Transportation into, out of, and around Vire

Trains
The train station is situated to the north of centre ville, about a 20 minute walk from the school. There are 5 trains a day that run between Paris and Vire (on the Paris-Granville line). The ride is more or less 2h30m. If you get a Carte 12-25 (HIGHLY recommended, get it as soon as you arrive in France, it costs 49€), the ride is 16.60€ one-way during the Periode Bleu (off-peak times). During the peak times, periode blanche the price is 24.90€ one-way. It’s easy to avoid Periode Blanche. The train leaves from Paris Montparnasse-Vaugirard. This is not in the main part of Montparnasse. If you’re in the main part of the station looking at the tracks, go all the way to the right, and you will see signs for Gare Vaugirard, which is about a 10 minute walk from the main part of the station. You can buy your train tickets at Vaugirard. The trains are Corail Intercités, not TGV, so you do NOT need a reservation! You can buy your ticket literally minutes before the train leaves. It is open seating in the trains. Some seats are reserved, but only once was I asked to move because I was sitting in a reserved seat… not a big deal.

Unfortunately, the train is only convenient to get to Paris. It’s possible to get to Caen on the train, but you have to switch in Argentan. Some trains are timed such that you only have to wait 10 minutes for the transfer.


Buses
You’ll most likely want to take the bus, operated by Bus Verts de Calvados when traveling to Caen. The ride is 6€ and change, or just under 5€ per ticket if you buy a book of 4 tickets. The bad part is that the ride is approximately 1h45m (It has many many stops available). The plus side is that the bus station is in centre-ville, so you don’t need to walk down the hill to (or up the hill back from) the train station. There is another bus service, Maneo, but they don’t go anywhere really worth visiting. It is worth knowing about it incase you may want to visit other assistants in towns served by Maneo. The bus services tend to be for students and local people commuting. Vire doesn’t exactly have the tourist in mind, since there are few. However, when there are tourists, it’s super easy to spot them because who else would be taking pictures of the town? Not that the town isn’t worthy of photos!

Vire does have a local bus service called Amibus. When you arrive in Vire, go to the tourist office to get a map of Vire and Amibus timetables. The French word for "timetables" is "les timetables." Ha. "Les Horaires" works too.