Hotel wine

We'd planned a relaxing start to the holiday. This morning, I packed, and PY completed his packing. We ate some leftovers for lunch. Then we locked up and rolled our suitcases out the door. 

We hadn't checked on the state of engineering works, but to our dismay, trains from Clapham were not heading to Gatwick, and we had to take the slightly longer journey on a tram from Wimbledon to East Croydon, where we made a connection to the airport-bound trains. The whole thing started badly when we arrived at the tram platforms at Wimbledon station. The next tram was shown as departing ten minutes after our arrival, PY stopped to get coffees from the stand while I was sent with the big cases to secure seats and storage. A few minutes later, my tram was unexpectedly left, and PY was still on the platform.  

The first stop was Dundonald Road, where I got off the tram and waited. PY was on the next one but hadn't been able to hold seats with space for luggage. We stood while the tram slowly meandered around Croydon town centre before letting us off at East Croydon station. After another false start, where we sat on a slow train due to depart within ten minutes, we eventually boarded a faster train for Gatwick leaving sooner.

On the journey, PY discovered that British Airways offers a twilight bag check service for passengers with early departures. After we'd checked in at the Hilton at the south terminal (thanks to credit card points this wasn't costing anything), we rearranged a little bit so that we'd have a change of clothes for tomorrow but could still check in the bags. Then, we returned to the terminal to find an almost deserted automated check-in line, placed our bags on the conveyor, got a receipt, and returned to the hotel. We went to the sports bar, where I ordered a glass of wine and, PY, a pint of Guinness, and we celebrated the start of the holiday. No rush required.

We opted to eat in the Yokozuna Japanese Steakhouse inside the hotel and found it a bit disappointing. We should have stuck to a more purist Japanese menu than the fusion burger. Afterwards, I wanted to do a bit more walking to ensure I reached my daily exercise goals, so we headed back to the terminal and bought a power adapter and a pack of cards from WH Smith before returning to the more ordinarily-priced hotel bar for another glass of wine (me) and an espresso martini (PY).