🛫 Single Terminal — Two Halls

Layout: a single building with the international hall on one wing and the domestic/regional hall on the other — sharing one central airside food court and the Air Austral Business Class Lounge.

Border: French Police aux Frontières handles all international arrivals; no Schengen check because Réunion is outside Schengen. Domestic flights to/from mainland France technically cross the Schengen line (because metropolitan France IS Schengen) but the Schengen check happens at CDG/Orly, not at RUN.

📍 Sainte-Marie — The Airport Commune

Sainte-Marie is a coastal-plain commune of around 33,000 residents, between the Saint-Denis bay and the Salazie cirque. The airport rim is car-park, fuel depot, freight forwarding.

Car Jaune stop: directly outside arrivals (the “Aéroport” halt) — the Réunion-wide coach network

A Schengen Visa Does NOT Authorise Réunion

If you need a visa to enter Schengen France, your Schengen visa does NOT extend to Réunion. You need a separate DOM-TOM visa (sometimes called a “France Outre-Mer” visa). Visa-exempt nationalities for Schengen are generally also visa-exempt for Réunion, but the legal authorisations are issued under different procedures.

EES & ETIAS Do NOT Apply to Enter Réunion

EES went live across Schengen on 10 April 2026. Réunion is outside Schengen, so EES does NOT apply at RUN. ETIAS, the €7 Schengen pre-travel authorisation due Q4 2026, similarly does NOT cover Réunion. The PAF officers at RUN use the French national passport-check system.

Euro — Cards Are King

Réunion runs on the euro since 2002 — identical to mainland France. Cards everywhere; contactless dominant in Saint-Denis and Saint-Gilles. ATMs at RUN arrivals. The mountain cirques (Mafate, Cilaos, Salazie) still favour small euro notes; carry €100-150 in cash if hiking.

⭐ Car Jaune — The Island-Wide Coach Network

• Lines E1, E2, E3, T, TX serve the airport, connecting to Saint-Denis (~30 min) and onward to Saint-Pierre, Saint-Benoît, Cilaos, Salazie.
• Single ticket around €2; the Z’éclair express shuttle is €5 for a faster non-stop airport service.
• Since 1 May 2026, the Région Réunion offers half-price subscriptions in response to rising fuel prices — useful for any stay longer than a week.
• Bus stops directly outside arrivals; the “Aéroport” halt is the integrated coach terminus.
• Verify the current carjaune.re schedule before relying on a specific connection.

🚌 Citalis 31 + 33 — Saint-Denis Urban

The Citalis urban network covers central Saint-Denis (population ~150,000, the largest city in Réunion). Connect from Car Jaune at the Gare Routière in Saint-Denis.

• Citalis Line 31: to the western neighbourhoods, including the Jardin de l’État.
• Citalis Line 33: coastal route along the Boulevard Sud.
• Fare around €1.50; cash to driver or pass.

🚐 JETCAR OI — Premium Coastal Shuttle

For travellers heading to the western beach resorts or the southern coast directly from the airport, JETCAR OI runs a daily premium shuttle service.

• RUN → Saint-Gilles-les-Bains: ~1 hour, the lagoon and beach-hotel area.
• RUN → Saint-Pierre: ~1 hour 30 minutes, the southern coast.
• Daily in both directions; book ahead via jetcaroi.fr.
• More expensive than Car Jaune (€25-40 per person) but air-conditioned with luggage capacity for beach-bag holiday traffic.

🚕 Taxi / Heetch

• Regulated taxi rank outside arrivals; metered, follows the Réunion taxi tariff. €25-40 to Saint-Denis centre, 20-25 min off-peak.
• Heetch (the French ride-hail) is active on the island; often a bit cheaper than the metered taxi, especially off-peak.
• No Bolt, no Uber in Réunion as of May 2026 — the French ride-hail regulation favours Heetch and the regulated VTCs.
• Rent-a-car desks (Sixt, Avis, Europcar, Hertz, plus local Locauto) line the arrivals hall; many visitors hire a car for the island week, since the cirques and the volcano are not feasible by bus.

🛋️ Air Austral Business Class Lounge

Location: airside near Gate 5.

Access: Priority Pass, LoungeKey, Air Austral Business, Flying Blue Elite Plus (on Air France codeshare flights via Air Austral).

Walk-in: approximately €40 (verify the current rate at the door).

What’s inside: Creole-leaning buffet (achards, samoussa, rougail saucisses on the hot bar, tropical fruit), open bar with Rhum Charrette and Savanna, espresso, runway view towards the Indian Ocean. Hours sync with scheduled flight departures, generally early morning through the last outbound.

✈️ Air France Salon — AF Business Only

Access: Air France Business Class, SkyTeam Elite Plus (Air France/KLM, Delta etc.), Flying Blue Platinum.

Does NOT accept Priority Pass. Walk-in is not available.

The defining Réunionese dish: a stew (cari, sometimes anglicised as “carry”) of meat, fish or vegetable with tomato, onion, garlic, ginger, turmeric and thyme, served with rice and the side rougail (chutney). Cari poulet (chicken), cari masalé, cari ti jacques (young jackfruit) and the Saint-Denis specialty cari mangue with lobster are the central versions. €12-25 per plate at a kreol restaurant; €15-22 at the RUN food court.

Smoked sausage stewed in a tomato + onion + garlic + ginger + thyme + piment rougail sauce, served on rice with the side grains (lentils or beans). The everyday Réunionese lunch. €10-18 at a kreol kitchen, €12-20 at the airport. Le Caritologue in Saint-Denis (wood-fire kreol cooking) is the central reference; food trucks at the markets are the affordable version.

Réunion has a serious rum-distilling tradition: sugar cane is the historical island crop. Rhum Charrette 49° is the cheap-and-cheerful workhorse in every Réunion kitchen; Savanna 50° is the more structured artisan rum; Isautier is the heritage label, distilling since 1845. The rhum arrangé (flavoured macerations with vanilla, pineapple, ginger, banana, faham orchid) are the local mixology specialty. €15-50 a bottle at the RUN duty-free.

Bichiques are the tiny baby fish of the Cotylopus acutipinnis and Sicyopterus lagocephalus river-mouth species, harvested at the river mouths from October to April. €40-80 per kilo — expensive, seasonal, the “caviar of Réunion.” Bouchons are the Réunionese Chinese-influenced steamed dumpling (pork or chicken), eaten as a snack or starter, €1 each at street stalls. Both small-batch Réunionese; neither widely exported.

🥃 Rhum Réunionnais

€15-50 per 700ml. Rhum Charrette (the cheap workhorse), Savanna Single-Cask, Isautier Réserve, Rivière du Mât. The rhum arrangé with vanilla and faham orchid is the Indian Ocean signature. EU customs allow personal-use returns to mainland France.

🌸 Bourbon Vanilla

€20-60 per 100g. “Vanille Bourbon” is the Réunion (formerly Île Bourbon) heritage vanilla — one of the world’s top three vanilla growing regions alongside Madagascar and Tahiti. Provanille and Vanille des Tropiques are the central producers; the small batches with the longer pod-lengths command higher prices.

🧂 Sel de Salines + Curry Mélange

€5-15. Sea salt from the Saline lagoon (south-west of the island) and the prepared Réunionese curry-spice blends — turmeric-coriander-cumin-cardamom-piment mixes for cari at home. Lighter than rum on the customs declaration.

🍫 Tablette de Chocolat Vanillé

€6-15 per tablet. Réunion-vanilla-flavoured artisan chocolate bars by local chocolatiers, plus jam and confiture (mangue, goyavier, ananas-Victoria) from small producers. The Eric Kahlhamer chocolaterie and the local confitureries are the airport-stocked brands.

Piton de la Fournaise (2,632 m, “Peak of the Furnace”) on the southern flank of Réunion is among Earth’s most active volcanoes, with eruptions every 1-3 years. Access via the Pas de Bellecombe trailhead (1 hour drive from Saint-Pierre, 2 hours from Saint-Denis), then a 2-3 hour hike across the plain-of-sands lunar landscape to the Dolomieu crater rim. Always check the Observatoire Volcanologique du Piton de la Fournaise (OVPF) for current eruption-alert status; trails close during eruptions, and the volcano-tourism crowds appear within hours of a new eruption announcement.

Réunion’s three crater-amphitheatre cirques — Mafate, Salazie, Cilaos — cluster around the dormant Piton des Neiges (3,070 m, the highest point in the Indian Ocean). UNESCO World Heritage since 2010. Mafate is uniquely road-free: it can only be reached on foot or by helicopter, with around 600 residents in small îlets (hamlets) supplied by helicopter drop. The Salazie cirque is road-accessible (Hell-Bourg is the heritage village); Cilaos has the famous thermal spa, hairpin RN5 road, and lentils Cilaos PDO. Multi-day hikes through all three (5-7 days) are the classic Réunion adventure.

The western coast between Boucan-Canot and Saint-Gilles-les-Bains is the only Réunion section with substantial sandy lagoon beaches protected by a coral reef. L’Hermitage is the snorkel-and-glass-bottom-boat anchor; Boucan-Canot is the surfing beach. Note the shark-attack history: Réunion’s shark situation is real (bull and tiger sharks; 25+ attacks since 2011), and surfing is restricted to designated zones with shark-netting (Cap Méchant, Saint-Pierre). Swimming inside the lagoon line is safe.

Saint-Denis (~150,000 residents) is the colonial-era capital with cases créoles (heritage Creole houses with wraparound verandas) along rue de Paris. The Hindu Tamil temples — particularly the Kalikambal Temple and the Petite Île Tamil temple — reflect the indentured-labour migration after 1848 slavery abolition. The Marché Forain (Sunday market on the Rambla) and the Jardin de l’État botanical garden are walkable from Place Sarda Garriga.

EU/EEA visitors: Roam Like At Home DOES cover Réunion since 2017 — your home EU plan works as if you were in Paris. Do nothing.
UK/US/non-EU visitors: Orange Réunion, SFR Réunion and Free Mobile sell prepaid SIMs at the RUN landside kiosk. €10-25 for 5-30 GB. ID required.
4G/5G: default in Saint-Denis and along the coastal road; the cirques (especially Mafate) have patchy-to-none coverage.

With 4+ hours airside-to-airside, the move is the capital. Car Jaune Z’éclair to central Saint-Denis (30 min, €5) or taxi (20 min, €25-40) — walk rue de Paris past the colonial cases créoles, the Cathedral, the Jardin de l’État, and lunch cari at a kreol restaurant near Place Sarda Garriga. Round trip 1h-1h 30m + 1h 30m in town. Allow 50 min for return security. With 6+ hours: a JETCAR OI shuttle to L’Hermitage lagoon is tight but possible. Piton de la Fournaise + Cirques are full-day trips; not for a layover.