Gatwick

What a day! Pouring rain and a low black sky that threatened us when the rain did stop - briefly -  now and again. The traffic was bad in patches on the M25 as we skirted London to the west and drove further south. We had become used to our useless GPS, but it didn't matter, the roads were well signed for Gatwick. However, we did have two problems to overcome. Firstly, when I'd reserved our hire car, I arranged to return it to their Gatwick North Terminal depot, very handy to the hotel we had booked and to the terminal we were leaving from. Unfortunately, since reserving our car, that depot had closed, and we were to return it to the depot at the South terminal. We had no idea of how far apart the two terminals were. Secondly, we had been told that the hotel we'd booked had no car park, only a quick drop off point. We decided to drop the car off first, and then to find our way to the hotel later, figuring that it couldn't be too hard to move from one terminal to the other, even in the rain.

After driving around one large roundabout a couple of times, trying to get into the right lane, we drove into the terminal area, trying to see where we had to go to return the car. The way was not signed very well, and I had to do some quick lane changes, just trusting that others on the road would be steering clear of this crazy driver. After one quick reversing manoeuvre we arrived at the rental return area - still pouring rain - which was a small lot filled with cars. There were signs in each parking bay for all the car rental companies, not in any order as far as we could see. As we drove around (with a few other confused drivers) we passed a small break in a wire fence and saw a small sign - 'Avis and Budget returns here' - beside a narrow break in the parked cars. We had arrived!

The young man signing the car in pointed us towards the area he said we'd find the shuttle to the North Terminal. By the time we got our bags and other gear from the car and reached a covered walkway, we were soaked. We sloshed through the water until we reached a travelling walkway that took us into the terminal. From there, we followed the signs to the North Terminal, travelling on another moving walkway, then on a monorail. At the North Terminal (at last!) we looked for the covered walkway the hotel advertised as the way from the terminal to their hotel. We couldn't find it so had to brave the road and footpath. We reached a door that had a sign, with an arrow pointing the way to the hotel entrance - around the corner. By this time we didn't care what we looked like, we just wanted to be dry. 

When we got to reception, when we asked about the covered walkway, we were shown the way we'd come. It was covered, we were told, once you went out of the hotel and crossed the road! We were an hour early for booking in, but I think they took pity on us because they let us book in immediately. We asked for an iron, so we could iron our crumpled clothes and asked if they had laundry facilities. That's something we've missed, not being able to wash our clothes. It would make a nice business for someone we reckon, putting some sort of laundry near hotels. (Lindy reminded me of the laundry someone in Brisbane set up for the homeless!)

The restaurant in this hotel is by reservation only, so we reserved a table for 6:30. We had some coins to get rid of so decided to splurge out. We had a lovely chicken curry, and then shared a dessert called chocalot. It came in a huge bowl, chocolate and vanilla ice cream, chocolate sprinkles, fudge bits, cream, rolled wafer biscuits and chocolate flakes! Decadent to say the least. We couldn't finish it all. We paid with cash to help get rid of the last of our coins, with £2 left over as a tip for our waitress. Then we staggered off to bed - have to be up early for our flight to Rome - we were told it takes some time to get through security here.