Tickets and passes
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For a short stay in the city, it's worth buying carnets of ten tickets, available from any station or tabac (€9.60, as opposed to €1.30 for an individual ticket). The city's integrated transport system is divided into five zones; the métro system more or less fits into zones 1 and 2. The same tickets are valid for bus, métro and, within the city limits and immediate suburbs (zones 1 and 2), the RER express rail lines, which also extend far out into the Île de France. Only one ticket is ever needed on the métro system, and within zones 1 and 2 for any RER or bus journey, but you can't switch between buses or between bus and métro/RER on the same ticket. Night buses (Noctambus) require separate tickets costing €2.44 each (buy these on board), unless you have a weekly or monthly travel pass (see below). For RER journeys beyond zones 1 and 2 you must buy an RER ticket; visitors often get caught out, for instance, when they take the RER to La Défense instead of the métro. Children under 4 travel free and from ages 4 to 10 at half price. Don't buy from the touts who hang round the main stations – you'll pay well over the odds, quite often for a used ticket – and be sure to keep your ticket until the end of the journey as you'll be fined on the spot if you can't produce one. If you're doing a number of journeys in one day, it might be worth getting a mobilis day pass (from €5 for the city to €11.70 to include the outer suburbs, though not the airports), which offers unlimited access to the métro, buses and, depending on which zones you choose, the RER.

If you've arrived early in the week and are staying more than three days, it's more economical to buy a Carte Orange with a weekly coupon (coupon hebdomadaire). It costs €13.75 for zones 1 and 2, is valid for an unlimited number of journeys from Monday morning to Sunday evening, and is on sale at all métro stations and tabacs (you'll need a passport photo). You can only buy a coupon for the current week until Wednesday; from Thursday you can buy a coupon to begin the following Monday. There's also a monthly coupon (mensuel) for €46.05 for zones 1 and 2. You need to write your Carte Orange number on the coupon.

Also available are the Paris Visites, one-, two-, three- and five-day visitors' passes at €8.35/13.70/18.25/26.65 for Paris and close suburbs, or €16.75/26.65/37.35/45.70 to include the airports, Versailles and Disneyland Paris (make sure you buy this one when you arrive at Roissy-Charles de Gaulle or Orly to get maximum value). A half-price child's version is also available. They're less good value than the Carte Orange and mobilis passes, but they do give reductions on certain tourist attractions. You can buy them from métro and RER stations, tourist offices and online at www.parisvisite.tm.fr. If you're going to Paris by Eurostar, you could save yourself time by buying the passes at Waterloo International – either from the information point or the souvenir shop underneath the escalator that heads up to platform entrances 21A/22A. You can get the Carte Musées et Monuments and Disneyland tickets here, too.

Both the Carte Orange and the Paris Visites entitle you to unlimited travel (in the zones you have chosen) on bus, métro, RER, SNCF and the Montmartre funicular. On the métro you put the Carte Orange coupon through the turnstile slot (make sure you retrieve it afterwards); on a bus you show the whole carte to the driver as you board – don't put it into the punching machine.

The RATP also runs numerous excursions, some to quite far-flung places, which are far less expensive than those offered by commercial operators. Details are available from the RATP's Bureau de Tourisme, place de la Madeleine, 1^er (tel 01.40.06.71.45; M° Madeleine). For 24-hour recorded information in English on all RATP services call 08.92.68.41.14 (premium rate) or visit online at www.ratp.fr.