Letter 10

…my first ever flight on my own.

Yes, I had everything planned for my trip to volunteer with the turtles, I was confident I could handle anything Greece had to throw at me. What I clearly couldn’t handle was getting from Mill Hill to Gatwick.

I had my train ticket all booked, and my mum took me to the station ready to say goodbye to her 18 year old daughter for 2 months. She cried. Of course, and I was a little emotional but I never cry, and this was no exception. (2 hours later I could’ve cried). At the station I met a girl who was also travelling to Gatwick, also to go to Greece. I thought – Great! I’ve already met a friend! HA! What happened was we spent the entire time chatting and having a great time. She was actually the girl who told me about Americamp, and is the reason I’m going to the States this summer. Little did we know, when we had changed trains, we got on the wrong one. I don’t know how we ever managed that.

It took 3 trains to get us back to where we were supposed to be and needless to say we were both anxious we would miss our flights. We arrived at Gatwick 40 minutes before takeoff, flustered and sprinting to check our bags in. We had a strange form of luck on our sides that day. I don’t know how we did it, but we both made our flights, and when I got to my departure gate, I was the first one there (see main picture of EMPTY ROOM)!

Throughout this palava I neglected to inform my mum of our idiocy and instead just spoke to her once I was safely boarding my plane. We laughed about this after.

Strangely, this whole experience made me more sure that I could do it. Travel. It finally felt real and I was really proud of myself. After that point, nothing else went wrong. (I am just really damn lucky with flights)

However, Gatwick will forever be tainted.

From Lou

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