A day in transit (No photos today)

Our last night in London, and another show to see.  "Billy Elliot" was one we hadn't seen before, but knew the story as we had seen the movie.  The musical was great with fabulous dancing by the young Billy.  The shows are so easy to get to.  You rock up during the day to one of the many selling offices to see what is available.  They are about half price to what you pay in Melbourne.  The only cheap thing in London!  All the theatres are very near an underground station, so very easy to do.

Our time in London ends, as we head to our next location, Barcelona.  So our day starts with the walk with cases back to the station.  The trains are every few minutes so we didn't have to wait long for a train to Victoria Station to catch the Gatwick Express.  This train went every 15 mins (cost being £17.50 each, not so cheap but good)

(We purchased an Oyster card on arrival in London (7 day ticket was £31.50) which gave us unlimited travel on trains or buses on the Metro.  (Not to Gatwick though as it was part of the National Rail System)?    The Oyster card was good value and we did get our money's worth.  We did catch a double decker bus one day, which was good because you got a different view from up).

Once at Gatwick, a little early, we had to wait a while before check in with our Vueling flight.  (Spanish)

Took ages checking in with only 2 staff doing the job.  Then it was ages before a gate was allocated, so people just standing around departure boards waiting to know where to go.  This is a large airport, so people mingling everywhere.  Eventually allocated a gate, walked the 2 km (exaggerating a little) and boarded about 15 mins later. Due to leave at 2.45pm.  We were up the front so nearly last to board.  It was a warm inside the plane.  A/C didn't seem to be working.  There seemed to be some issue as lots of people in airport fluros seemed to be going in and out of the cockpit.  In the mean time, everyone was getting a little warm (in had been a nice, warm day).  People getting quite restless, especially a few around us that had  connecting flights.  Captain comes out to explain that there is a slight problem, but we should be right to leave in 10 mins.  After 2 hours of sitting in the sauna, there were some ugly sights and comments.  They couldn't even get us off as the walkway had been removed when they thought we were right to go.  Some water was handed out, all the door were open to give us some air, with lots of people standing around these.  Lots of smelly, sweaty and stressed folks.  When the Captain came out again, one lady gave him a mouthful.  Not pretty.  It was pretty hot in the cockpit for the Captain too.  Eventually things got sorted, the A/C cooled everybody down and we got on our way.

Everybody was looking forward to cool drink, but they took ages to bring them out as the staff had to have their lunch/dinner behind the curtain!  I would say that we won't fly with Vueling again, but we are next week!

Got to Barcelona about 2 1/2 hours later than we were expecting, so nearly dark.  Time change as well so we lost an hour of daylight.  We caught the Aerobus to the city (€5.90) about a 25 min ride. (Much cheaper than the Gatwick Express)

It was then into a taxi to get to our Hotel.  Only a few km away, but we weren't going to try to find it at night.  

This hotel is the Travelodge; modern, large room, reasonable bathroom and Airconditioning!  Essential here as it is very warm and humid, and it is less than 1/2 the price of London.  

It was about 9.30 when we headed around the corner to Rambla La Poblenou, with street dining all the way down the middle of the street.  Tapas and a vino tinto sangria went down very well.

Hasta Luego!  (See you later)