A Night in Heathrow

OK, I'm cheap. Or frugal. Or rational, or something like that. Often it comes out to my detriment. Since the Sunday-Monday night stay was to be on my dime, I figured I would hang out in Heathrow for the evening. The Eurostar was to come in from Paris at 22:35 or something like that, and I needed to be at Heathrow around 06:00 for my 08:00 flight. Why spend 85 GBP ($130) for a rushed 4-hour hotel stay, by the time I got in and out and all that? Right. Now, I'm used to US Airports, most of the major hubs have stuff going on (restaurants, bars, etc) until about 2 or 3 for those late-arrivers. Some of our airports in the States (Chicago, Houston, Atlanta) run all night! And Heathrow is THE hub for most of Europe entry. Unbeknownst to me, Heathrow is in a 'residential' area, as far as its approaches and departures. Nothing in or out from 22:30 til 06:00. So it shuts down.

So I took the last tube to Heathrow (this should have been a clue!) at about 23:15. Heathrow Terminal 3, that is. My flight (Continental) was to depart from Terminal 4. Well, I arrived at Terminal 1/2/3 stop (Terminal 2, actually), and quickly found that all the doors were shut for the intraHeathrow connections, and Terminal 2 was dark. Oh, crap! I secured a cart for my bags and thought fast... The bus station would have people in it! I was fresh from hobo-rich France, remember. So I walked across the street to the bus depot. The law of buggies and carts is indeed universal. I had mongoloid wheels on mine that would cause the thing to gyrate horrendously unless I constantly corrected it. Not quite as many joules burned as carrying everything, but close. Thank goodness it was about 10 degrees out (50 or so F), so the walk to the bus depot was bearable and any prospects of sitting on a bench were survivable. Rats! Nothing doing, no transportation to Terminal 4, where I could have hunkered down and huddled up til morning, close to my departure point. I saw signs for the walkway to Terminal 3. I dimly recollected something (cafe?) in Terminal 3 being 24-hour.

Sure enough, when I went 'round the bend in the road, there was a pile of young football fanatics (more in another post on football in Europe) kicking a soccerball around in front of the terminal. Despite looking like it was completely being remodeled, Terminal 3 had working entrances and lifts. I poked around the pre-security area and chatted with a nice Indian lady at the cafe who informed me that, yes, this cafe was indeed 24-hour, and she used it as a resting spot every three months or so during her mandatory overnight at Heathrow due to her connections to India and the US. Now, despite all of my ranting and raving against chain restaurants and the like, they have a major advantage: they can afford to operate outlets at a loss in order to increase customer perception. Some bright light at the Costa cafe franchise decided that it would be worth his or her time to have an employee or two staff the cafe in Heathrow 24/7, on the odd chance that a grateful (cheapskate) business traveler (like me) would want some companionship for those wee hours. Thank you Costa!

So Alena (phoenetic) and I chatted for about a half hour, then I went outside to stretch my legs, and the footballers were winding down, they were whining about being thirsty or something like that. I 'oi'd one of them over to inform him that the cafe was open and don't you know they had cold water and sports drinks? Grateful gratefuller young men you have never seen. They went up to the cafe for a good hour, and gave Ravi, the staffer, more business at 2 am in 15 minutes than he'd probably gotten cumulative up to that point for the last 5 hours.

I toyed with the idea of using the internet, then decided against it. Why bother? It was 2, I was almost halfway through this thing... yawn! I found an empty seat, a surprising feat - there must have been 60 people sprawled across the floors and seats of the second floor of Terminal 3, trying to sleep or chatting or glowering. I listened through my entire music collection and 2 German lessons. I think I may have dozed off, because it was suddenly 05:30 and the lights were coming on! Staff was arriving! Security was open for business! I went back to Costa to get 'one for the road' from Ravi, but unfortunately I missed the changing of the shift at 5. Alena was also vanished, off to Boston. Ah well, to borrow from Fight Club, 'single-serving' friends. I drank the coffee and waited a little bit more, to watch the wakening of Terminal 3. Taking my cart, and cursing the new bruises on my shins from it, I coasted and cantered to the Heathrow express for Terminal 4. I entered the terminal, and the ticket and security queue processes well known to all of us 21st century people.

Ah, progress.

[GJF: Written 22 January 2009]