Ok, I know I joked about the weather being so horrible in the UK we were off to Gatwick!  But… in fact….. actually…. we are in Gatwick!

We have owned a timeshare in Malta for a few years and we tend to go every other year for two weeks, mainly to scuba dive.  We booked this holiday back in January and at that time Daisy was coming with us.  Then, she changed jobs and couldn’t get this period off, hence she came to Cyprus instead.  So, it’s just the two of us…. Except….. we have company for the first week.  Our friends, Stuart and Fi, are staying at the same hotel for a week starting shortly after our arrival!  Stuart is also diving which will be great.  He was my first UK diving buddy, over 30 years ago….. and we have all dived together a great many times since then.

Anyway, we fly tomorrow with BA at 8:05, pretty early really.  We decided to come over tonight and stay at the Bloc hotel which is actually inside the Gatwick South terminal.  It is literally right next door to where you go through to security checks.

We had booked meet and greet and that all went off very well.  At Gatwick, several of the airlines, including BA, allow you to check your bags the day before your flight, after 4pm. We took advantage of this and said goodbye to our luggage there and then.  We used the new (or new to us) self check in bag drops.  You scan your boarding card (ours were on our phones) and then it prints you out the sticky bag label, you stick it on, confirm you’ve done it, the machine weighs the bag and if all is well, it disappears off and you get a receipt emailed to your account.  Amazing!  Worked a treat.

We then walked up one floor and about 50 yards to The Bloc hotel.

We stayed here before a few years ago and were quite impressed at the convenience, so decided to give it another go.  The rooms are not huge but they are very comfortable.  The bed is massive, approaching a super-king and a very good mattress.  There is a large flat screen tv.  The bathroom/wet room is fine and the shower is powerful.  What more can you ask for an overnight?  Oh, yes it’s very quiet too.  The rooms are very high tech.  Everything is controlled from a tablet: lights; ac; and the amazingly effective blackout window blind.  You even check yourself out that way.  I think it was about £65 for the overnight.

There isn’t a restaurant but there are several within 50 feet in the terminal, plus coffee shops, etc.  We had dinner at Giraffe, a nearby restaurant where the Bloc have a discount.  We got two free drinks.  As I am on a diet and not drinking alcohol at all, Bob had both.  He had a Malaysian chicken curry with all the trimmings, chutney, sauce, breads, rice and I had a steak with green salad and green veg.  I then had a black coffee and he had a mint tea and a three scoop ice cream sundae.  Life is cruel…..  Together with the two free beers it all came to £40.  Not cheap but not too bad.   The food was pretty nice.  We’re back again in January just before flying to India, and I would eat there again.

So… off to bed and off to Malta tomorrow.  The weather looks a bit mixed but it is definitely going to be a heck of a lot warmer and sunnier than the UK.