Arrival in Paris
We meet in Paris, in front of the Saint-Sulpice Church, at 6:00am on Saturday 23 May, 2026.
There is no organised group travel plan for the chapter, since several people will be joining from different places, chiefly from Malta and the UK.
We highly suggest you travel on Friday, 22nd of May, and spend the night in Paris, since we need to meet early in the morning in front of Saint-Sulpice Church, which is in the VIe arrondissement of Paris, i.e., in the very centre.
Travelling from Malta
If you plan to come from Malta, the most straightworward way is to fly to Paris, either to Charles de Gaulle Airport (CDG), or Orly Airport (ORY).
You can find good prices for flights on websites such as SkyScanner: at the time of writing, a Malta → Paris round-trip costs around €100.
Travelling from the UK
If you plan to come from the UK, you have several options. Especially if you live close to London, the easiest (but priciest) way to get to Paris is via the Eurostar train, which at the time of writing costs around £80 each way. The obvious advantage of taking the Eurostar is that you leave from central London (St Pancras) and arrive straight in the centre of Paris (Gare du Nord).
At face value it is cheaper to fly, but keep in mind that you will also have to pay for trains (around £12) or buses (around £5) to and from the airports, which might make the Eurostar the best option after all. At the time of writing you can find London → Paris flights on SkyScanner for around £50 each way.
If you are strapped for cash, there is also the option to catch an overnight bus from London to Paris, which at the time of writing costs around £33 each way from FlixBus.
Accommodation in Paris
For the Friday night just before the Pilgrimage, just as with the travel, we do not organise one large booking as a group. There are several (relatively) cheap hotels in Paris, such as the Ibis hotels. Usually we split into groups, sharing an Airbnb for the night, or a few twin rooms in an Ibis hotel. Check on Booking.com and Airbnb to see what you can find, but be sure to communicate with people in the WhatsApp chat if you haven’t found a group yet!
It’s not essential that you book somewhere very close to Saint-Sulpice, as long as you are close to a Metro station (ideally a line 4 station since that’s the one for Saint-Sulpice). Make sure you can arrive there by 6:00am, check the metro schedule for the morning of Saturday 23 May, and allow some extra time for any unforeseen delays.
At the End of the Pilgrimage
The Pilgrimage ends at Chartres Cathedral on Monday 25 May 2026.
The organisers provide (for an additional cost) a train ticket back to Paris at the end of the Pilgrimage in the late afternoon, but a specific train time is not guaranteed (there are several trains that they block book). You can instead book your own ticket at a specific time. Unlike the UK, trains in France are not very expensive, at the time of writing a Chartres → Paris train is around £15 from Trainline. If you plan to go back to Paris on the same day as the Pilgrimage ends (9th June), especially if you’re flying, I encourage you to book the train as soon as possible. Book the ticket for after 18.00, to allow enough time to pick up your luggage after mass.
I do encourage first time pilgrims to spend the night in Chartres, it’s a beautiful city and much quieter the next day. It will also be a lot easier to get inside the Cathedral the next morning.
Further Questions
If you have any further questions about the Pilgrimage, please feel free to reach out to myself or Abbé Zak over WhatsApp, or email me on:
luke (at) collins (dot) mt
(Replace (at) with @ and (dot) with .)