This is my island in the sun - pre trip day

[Guest]

Friday 19th May 2017

Pre trip day

"I’ll get a flashing light fitted on that!"

So it is pre travel day but for us we count it all part of the holiday.

We were up at 6:30a.m. Darrin, my hubby, is not the fastest of people first thing in the morning. 3 coffees – (bean to cup) before he knows what day it is. He needs that gadget that Wallace had to get out of bed and dressed in the mornings.





We drag ourselves into the day and pre breakfast, I take our Westie, Blair for a walk.

He’s not co-operating this morning. Lots of No 1s but no No 2s if you know what I mean. By the time I get back Darrin has readied all of Blair’s stuff that he will need on his holiday. By that I mean he goes to stay at his groomer’s house. Barbara, who is Polish and her builder husband Bob, adore dogs. They have a rescue Labrador of their own. As Barbara does dog grooming the house is normally full of canines in all shapes and sizes. Blair loves meeting other dogs and is never aggressive with them. He has a whale of a time. He bosses the other dogs to the point that he has the sofa all to himself!

Being the “school run” it takes us a good 30 minutes to get from where we live to Hatch End – a distance of four miles! Don’t you just love Greater London?

No way would I ever consider a kennel set up. We know he’s happy at Barbara’s. As we leave her house it is as if he doesn’t care. He’s with his doggy mates. See you in a week Dads!

We have to head into Harrow to call at Barclays bank as Darrin has some business cheques that need banking It’s now gone 9a.m. and bank dealt with we head to Costa for a cheese toastie and a coffee. We prefer Costa out of all of the coffee shops because their baristas are really friendly and they know me as a regular. One of the guys must be 6 foot 12 inches. The Customer Service at this branch is impeccable.

We are back home by mid morning where I empty the kitchen bins and the food waste caddy ready for Monday’s collection. We have a great neighbour who does the honours for us and we always get him a little thank you for doing so.

Darrin has to catch up on business. Owning your own company, particular one dealing in IT, means you have to be available 24/7. Clients don’t accept the word “No”! As he gets on with that I tumble the washing we put on last night – what a joyous life I lead.

We can’t dump our luggage at Gatwick until 4p.m. – Early bag drop as BA call it. No twilight references here. So its 3p.m. before we head out on the M25 to circle around and down to the M23 for Gatwick airport. (We only live 20 minutes from Heathrow!) We get there at 4:30p.m. so Darrin guides us into the short stay car park. What is it with the turning points in there? You can see where previous cars have removed their door paint on the barriers. It is so tight if you have a larger vehicle. I know Blue 2 is the recommended floor as it is level with the arrivals entrance but it is choc a bloc. We have to go up to level 3. Once sorted we head back down a floor with our cases and head for check in area A. There is one lady in front of us. Our check in takes all of five minutes and our two cases go merrily sailing off into the bowels below. So it’s head back to the car. In doing so we totally miss the ONE pay point for the entire car park which is at level 2 terminal entrance.

There are no machines anywhere near the lifts on any other level. It’s only when we get to level 3 that we realise all this. Darrin has to go back to level 2 and all the way to practically the terminal entrance to pay the parking. To me he is gone for such a long time as I’d gone back to the car. Twenty minutes later he appears with steam coming out of his ears. I won’t repeat the profanities he enthused.

Because this our stay is 32 minutes and we have to find £7. As they say - even Dick Turpin wore a mask!

B---er us when you get to the exit barriers the damn things take cards! Aaargh! Now I know why we tend to fly from Heathrow.

We now have to find our hotel. We have chosen the Sandman Signature. Instead of turning off for the Copthorne where we have stayed in the past we turn off the other way to Tindsley Lane. The hotel is just off a roundabout and on arrival we discover that as a guest we have to pay £5 for an overnight stay. I will never whine again about $25 at a Universal Studios hotel! The car goes to the Long Stay car park in the morning.

The hotel is having some refurbishment here and there. I love the cushions:

Done with baggage ID tags:

You can buy them on the web: airportag/collections/airport-pillows

The room is lovely once we get into it. I don’t what it is with room cards and us. Darrin pops it in the slot at room 324 and we get a red light. He tries again – red light. Third time – red light. He troops back to reception where some woman is having a meltdown – she was ranting as we checked in ….
”I spent an hour on the phone explaining all this. Do I have to go through it all again?” We hadn’t lingered to see what the problem was.
Whilst Darrin is sorting admission to our room I sit on the floor with our overnight bags. A guy comes along and says: Are you OK? I explain we can’t get in the room. He then adds: Neither could we. Took 3 attempts!

Darrin returns with new room card and we get admitted. It’s a lovely room – even has a microwave – if we had something to heat!

I take photos of the room and Darrin promptly goes head long over a very large brown leather pouffe. I did the Specsavers' line and add : Can I get you a flashing red light for that? The response cannot be repeated on a family forum.

This is rich coming from me. Only on Wednesday night I had walked into our conservatory in bare feet and skidded on some water on the tiles – presumably there from drips from a watering can I had use earlier. My right leg shot out in front of me. Landed mostly on my left buttock with my left led folded under me. Darrin was out for the evening so I had to try and scramble up. The dog was all over me trying to lick me with a very concerned attitude. I struggled to my feet and only then realised I had scrapped all my toes on both feet. Result is I currently have two bunches of grapes where my toes should be. I have a lovely bruise down my left arm, a bruised backside and I have wrenched my back. No way is that stopping me going on holiday! The fact I take Warfarin makes me look like I’m President of the self - harm society!
Two days later and things are starting to ease. On the night itself I sat with a bag of frozen sliced beans on one foot and a bag of frozen corn on the other! I did, of course, let Darrin know what had happened and he came home early from his meeting.

We get sorted and then crack open a bottle of champagne.

We had intended to pop to Crawley Leisure Park to see a film - Guardians of the Galaxy 2) but we missed all the 5:30 ish start times. The next round was 7:30pm. so that would have meant us eating really late or early. (That’s why we never do Fantasmic dinner packages at Disney’s Hollywood Studios.) We don’t do dinner at 4:45p.m. thanks !Our flight is 10:00a.m. tomorrow so we need to be in that airport 7:30 ish in the morning so we can have breakfast in the BA lounge.

We book dinner for 7:30p.m. which is exactly where we are headed right now. The Shark Grill is fine.

The menu isn’t over inspiring but it’s reasonable and offers simple fare. We get chatting to the restaurant reception lady and learn the place used to be the Ramada but a Canadian Company, Northern Properties or some such have taken it over and they are completely refurbishing the place. That’s why the bar is currently closed. There is a second of their hotels in Newcastle Upon Tyne. They have loads in Canada!

So we are ravenous. Darrin starts with grilled shrimps and I have nachos with the most fiery jalapeno peppers I have ever encountered:

We follow with fish, chips and mushy peas for me and scallops for Darrin. Their triple cooked chips are to die for. A nice bottle of 2015 Chablis completes the meal.

The sun is setting and it’s really a nice sight considering we had a monsoon this afternoon.
Hot soak in the bath for me and then early night when I’ve sorted this report.

Night night.


INDEX: https://DIBB.in/12539741

[Gryff]

Our departure routine sounds like yours except the dog sitter comes to us so l do the clean clean clean mad woman thing even although they only use the family room the guest bed/bathroom and kitchen
I usually bash bruise or break something. Or one of the grown up sons have a crisis usually car related so it's come and get mine
Love when we hit the hotel the night before as themmst home know it's got to be dog related or fire flood or famine otherwise deal with it you have my CC

[margyloveswdw]

Have a fab trip!

[Rob & Jan]

Great start, have a fabulous holiday.

[Eeyore rocks]

Great start to your holiday...pleased that you got away with only a few bruises...and bunches of grapes for toes.

Safe travels for tomorrow. 😘

[Guest]

You're very lucky you didn't rip your hamstrings on that fall. Great start, am signing up.

[Melvin Pearce]

Hope you both have a good sleep and a good flight tomorrow.

Melvin now always put his card in at the exit of the car park, sorry Darrin you had to go for a walk back to the terminal.

Looking forward to your next report.

Lesley and Melvin

[Guest]

Blair looks utterly adorable.

[Guest]

Thanks folks.
I've added another picture of those great cushions (a bit out of focus) and the contact to get them. Note the time of this post. Silly o'clock has struck!

[Guest]

Originally Posted by FairyNuff

You're very lucky you didn't rip your hamstrings on that fall. Great start, am signing up.

See more...

I already had a peroneal tendon problem. Darrin reckons it is time I booked into "Shady Pines". (Remember Golden Girls?)