Friday 20th March
Chilson to Heathrow
Holiday starts today
In the normal course of events Jo and I clean the kitchen on a Friday morning, but this being the official start of our holiday... we clean the kitchen!
The rest of the morning we finalise our packing and Jo waters every last plant, indoors and out, in the hope they will survive until our return.
We have arranged for Wychwood Taxis to collect us at noon to take us to Heathrow. Our flight tomorrow requires that we check-in around 8:00am, and rather than risk not getting to the airport for any reason we opted to stay overnight. The closest hotel I could find was the Hilton Garden Inn at Terminal 2, allegedly a short walk to Terminal 3.
We arrived at the hotel at about 2pm and were relieved and pleased we were able to check-in. Our room is on the 9th floor overlooking the take-off runway - what a view! Amazingly we don't hear the sound of the aircraft.
A quick snack of crisps and tomato juice in the 'Apron Bar' (overlooking the adjacent car park!) and we decide to do a reconnoitre of the route to Terminal 3 so we have an idea of how long it will take us tomorrow. There is a sign in the hotel reception, on the second floor, with an arrow saying 'link to terminal 2 & 3', which we dutifully follow. It's a covered walkway about 40 metres long that dumps us in a car park. We had a similar experience at Gatwick last year - signs that promise the world only to disappoint. Anyway, we got to Terminal 2 and then followed signs to Terminal 3. Apart from the last 50 metres the whole route is covered/underground and took us about 15-20 minutes. At least we won't get wet if it rains.
Snoozing and reading The Times in our room kept us amused for the rest of the afternoon, before dinner in the hotel and an early night (after watching Gardeners' World), ready for an early start tomorrow.
