Thursday 4th August 2016

Thankfully, this should be the last time I have to travel through Heathrow on my to and from Denmark; on the 15th this month, flights from London City begin again. The crowds, queues, traveling and extra costs makes it an pretty unpleasant experience. Saying that, what with taking time off to visit churches, real ale micro pubs, looking at trains, views of London as we are on final approach makes it a mixed blessing. But most of all there is the added time the trip takes, six hours from LCY and more than eight from LHR.

Take yesterday; I left from the hotel in Arhus at half seven, and walked into the house at twenty to five, twenty to six CET. A whole day of traveling. Nine hours. And that's each way, so losing nearly two out of five working days to travel.

So, anyway; back to yesterday.

Another day when the alarm wakes me up, and I can hear the rain hammering down outside. It is falling so hard, I can barley see the far side of the hotel. Lovely day for driving on the motorway I thought. But by the time I have showered, packed, dressed, checked out and had breakfast, the rain had stopped and the clouds were clearing. By the time I got in the car, it was twenty to eight and the roads drying out.

And as the Danish holiday season nears the end of its forth week, even the ring road to the motorway was clear, meaning I could have left later if I had known. But it did mean I could cruise along at 110 rather than 130, enjoying the drive in the Audi, all the while listening to rawk on the radio. I know the route so well now, I don't have to think about it, just bowl along, looking at the crops in the fields or the wild flowers on the road verges.

I arrive at the airport to find there are few queues now, plenty of people in the departure hall, but not in the numbers seen two weeks ago. I find a table to work from, power up the laptop and check mails, send grenades; the usual stuff.

The plane is almost full, and I have a window seat, so I can snooze until the engines start. I have a Danish couple in the seats beside me, they seem quite excited about going to London. I've been there so I am not.

We are pushed back, the engines start, and soon we are taxiing to the far end of the airport to line up on the runway; the engines roar, and we leap forward. The toddler in the seats in front of me screams.

Bye bye Denmark, at least for two weeks.

Each time I open my eyes, I see another airline too close for comfort, either traveling in the same direction, or passing just below us. One seemed to be only a thousand feet away, crossing our path at an angle, it was worrying. But my eyes closed again soon after.

I accept the offer of a cup of tea and a couple of lemon biscuits, before snoozing some more as the fly down the Dutch coast, opening them again as we were flying over Clacton.

Oh Essex, how do I love thee? A lot when I'm on my way home.

We are held over south Essex, getting lower with each circuit. As we turned for the final time over East London, I got shots of Canary Wharf, The Isle of Dogs, and the City stretched along the river. Over Battersea, Kew Gardens and Richmond Park until we swoop ever lower until we were down. Back home.

Or at least Heathrow.

Our gate was opposite immigration, and once again there were no queues, so I zig zag through the lanes, straight to a scanning machine and am through. Our bags even turn up in ten minutes, meaning I can clear customs and be down on a train for central London before one.

The Heathrow Express whisks us to the mainline through the long tunnel, then through West London into Paddington. Up the stairs, over the bridge to the Underground which is overground here, and a 4 minute wait for a train to St Pancras. But I miss the half one train to Folkestone by three minutes, meaning I have 57 minutes to wait for the next one, which means one thing: beer.

There is a cafe near to the Southeastern platform that has a small bar, and sells ice cold bottles of beer. I have struck up a friendship with the Russian barman, and swap smalltalk with him. As I drink the first bottle, I hear home talking to his colleagues in a language that wasn't English or Russian. I ask home what he was speaking; Spanish he said. He also told me he spoke French and Italian. Clever bloke, so modest and provides me with cold beer when I ask. I ask him for another.

I get a message from Jools, she can pick me up from the station as she has done so many hours this week, so no need for a taxi to pick me up after riding the rail replacement bus.

I make it to the platform just as the train pulls in, I get on board, select a seat which satisfies my requirements, then relax for the 15 minutes before departure.

Jools is running late, so I have a wait at Folkestone West, the sun is shining so its nice just to be out in it. She arrives, I throw my bags in the boot, and we go home, along old Folkestone Rad to avoid the port traffic, finally up Castle Hill and along Deal Road to home.

And as we are both hungry, at twenty to five, JOols goes to the chippy for dinner, I butter some bread for chip butties and make the drinks. Nothing beats fish and chips, with lots of salt and vinegar. The batter on the fish still crunchy, its golden colour contrasting with the pure white of the fresh fish inside.

There is TOTP from 1982 again, then the rail documentary, and being August it is now dark by nine, and bed beckoned once more.