Leaving Dublin for London Gatwick ...

I went in search of gate 414 where my return flight awaited me. I'd been fortunate enough to get a window seat – seat 1a no less – and fuelled with childish excitement I made my way to the gate, realising as I walked that I totally understood the notion of a so-called 'United States of Europe'. It might sound a little daft, but whenever I find myself in the USA I quite enjoy walking around, say, Chicago O'Hare airport while waiting for a connecting flight to somewhere like Pittsburgh or Cleveland. As I stroll along, I like passing the departure gates and looking at various destinations: Grand Rapids, Sioux Falls, Cedar Rapids, Charlotte, Baton Rouge – it goes on and on – and normally, sitting on a chair waiting patiently for a flight is a stereotypical American, wearing cowboy boots, Levis, a Harley Davidson tee-shirt and so on. I find myself looking at these people with their peculiar forms of 'being American' and thinking what a diverse, massive country this is, made up of many states, all of which are very different from one another; and then I find myself wanting to spend a lot more time in this great country, checking out the various states, seeing what they have to offer, driving from one to the other – where else in the world can I do this, I might ask myself. And then it would twig: why, right on my own doorstep, of course, that's where! Now, as I walked towards gate 414 I passed many other gates: Dusseldorf; Corfu, Munich; Paris, Zagreb, Budapest, you name it – the United States of Europe where I could, should I so choose to, fly or drive or take the train to visit these places. Who needs the USA to travel great distances without really leaving 'home'?

But then my brow furrowed as I realised that the United Kingdom (somehow even the name of the cuntry seems wrong these days) was on its way out of Europe on a road towards isolation, no longer part of the whole, but a small island off the mainland, a place not really liked by the Europeans, a place full of bigoted old people and men with tattoos on their calves, with an inflated idea of their own importance, a place where Europeans think twice before they order a steak sandwich or a roast chicken dinner because the beef might be hormone-injected and the chicken washed with chlorine. The United Kingdom will become a place where Europeans are classed as 'other countries' rather than the EU when they are processed by British immigration officials at passport control. And when we journey into Europe, of course, we too will find ourselves queuing in the line reading 'other countries', no longer part of things, no longer European.

Is it just me?
Is it just me? I wonder how many times I've asked that question? Is it just me or is it impossible to find a quiet and deserted restroom at an airport, somewhere without the sound of hot air driers or somebody else in the next cubicle making an unappetising noise – and a considerably more unappetising smell. I can wander for miles at some airports, past lonely and unoccupied departure gates in search of a toilet and when I find one, there's loads of people making a noise and being generally unpleasant. It's not like a hotel where, if you look hard enough, you can stumble upon an oasis of calm with cubicles sporting solid wood doors, sturdy locks and no gaps in the adjoining walls where the shoes and scrunched up trousers of an unwanted neighbour are revealed.

Posh hotel toilets with piped musak and a not a soul in sight, a place to relax and meditate and do what comes naturally – ideal if you're trying to avoid a know-all bastard who won't stop talking. But no, not at an airport. Airports are noisy, crowded places full of people pulling suitcases behind them. Sometimes it might be possible to find an area of calm, a deserted gate, a place to stretch out away from the madding crowds, but it's the exception, not the rule.

The best part of any airport is the restaurants, the eateries, the places where you can enjoy a few moments of peace nursing a peppermint tea and a Danish pastry or, as I enjoyed at Dublin airport prior to departure, a blood orange tea and a scone. Very tasty and I was able to eavesdrop on the know-all and the stooge (see previous post).

Back in the country...

I'm now in the plane and we're about to land at London Gatwick. Outside the patchwork quilt of green and brown fields, lakes and ponds and a landscape familiar to me – that of country lanes and small villages – similar if not the very same places that I encounter on my weekly rides with Andy at the weekends. The hot summer has left many fields parched and brown. I look out to see if I can spot any familiar landmarks. There are plenty of country houses, a racetrack, lakes, long-term car parks as the runway looms, trees like florets of brocolli, cars, the M23, more car parks, woods, the railway line, other planes, a wind sock and we're on the ground at 1855hrs. It's hotter here than in Dublin, there's less cloud and a lovely hazy evening sunshine.

The plane is making it's way to the terminal building, past the control tower. I can see plenty of white and orange easyJet aircraft parked up or making their way towards the runway, plenty of staircases on wheels leading nowhere, and vast expanses of tarmac with arrows, yellow arrows, pointing at, hold on, pointing at those staircases, meaning just one thing: a bus to the terminal building! Or maybe not, we're still on the move, being chased by an electric airport vehicle with the number 184 emblazoned on its sides. No, it's going to be a jetty and a terminal building. Phew! We've arrived, the plane has stopped and it's time to go.

But no, I was mistaken. A short walk through the tunnel didn't lead to the carpeted comfort of the terminal building, it led to a concrete staircase and an awaiting bus, which took us to baggage reclaim. I was told off by security for taking photographs (see below).

The bus from plane to terminal building