Those without a strong stomach, look away now

All was looking good. We had a ten-hour flight ahead of us the next day, so we’d booked into the Premier Inn at the airport. For once, we didn’t have an early flight – it was leaving around lunchtime – but the plan was to have a bit of a lie-in to give us the energy to get through the next day. The kids had their own beds, so there was to be no wriggling and kicking me in the back in bed (unless Lee had a strange night…), and they’d both fallen asleep quickly and easily. After the obligatory game of cards in the bathroom, Lee and I opted for an early night, hoping to wake no earlier than 8 o’clock, feeling refreshed. Ha!

It started going wrong when Finn (my seven-year-old) decided it was the perfect night to practise talking (and shouting) in his sleep. While hubby slept through (of course), I barely managed more than an hour of uninterrupted sleep before I was awoken to yet more unintelligible ramblings and the occasional yell. And at 6 o’clock, my ‘sleep’ finally came to an end when Dylan (my four-year-old) called plaintively from the bathroom that he had a tummy ache. We assumed, as you do, that it was wind or he needed a poo, and we sat with him patiently, eyes barely open, waiting for it to go away. Then he said he felt sick. Now he hadn’t been sick since around the time of his first birthday (and that’s yet another holiday tale to tell), and he’s never been one to complain. Lee and I looked at one another with undisguised panic. It was early, he was tired and hungry and excited – surely that’s all it was? We all get that feeling when we haven’t eaten – that gnawing in your stomach that feels like nausea. Add that to the butterflies feeling ahead of an exciting holiday. He wasn’t really ill, was he? Then he was sick.

It could have been worse. It was in the toilet. It didn’t get on his clothes (and thereby lies yet another holiday story). And it was barely more than a trickle. The sort of sick you do when you’re not really ill but trying anyway. Me being me, I’m straight on Facebook asking everyone what to do. We have a ten-hour flight ahead of us for goodness’ sake! But then I look at Dylan – he looks fine and he tells us he feels much better now. Maybe he’s okay – just a one-off? Maybe all he needs is some food in his empty stomach to take away the nausea? Lee and I quickly decide that we don’t want to risk going downstairs to sample the hotel breakfast in the restaurant just in case, so Lee is quickly dispatched to buy some food and bring it back to the room. My fear quietly subsides while he’s gone, as I watch the boys chatting and messing around without a care in the world. Dylan’s fine, nothing to worry about. Lee soon comes back with some panettone (interesting breakfast choice). Dylan eats some slowly, as instructed. Meanwhile, I’m feeling pretty sick myself with all the worry (or so I thought) and barely pick at my panettone. Then Dylan throws up again – plenty this time. There’s no escaping the fact that he’s ill…

At this point, all hell broke loose. What should we do? How ill was he? How would he (we) survive the flight? Would he still be ill when we got to Jamaica? Did he need a doctor? Should we cancel? And was that sicky feeling in my tummy stress or something more? Thank goodness for 3G – I was instantly on my phone looking at flights, insurance details, airline rules, etc. etc. Could we postpone and get the next available flight? Er, no. The next flight was three days away, which would give us precisely three full days in Jamaica before we had to fly home again – not really an option. That’s not even accounting for the fact that the flight was likely to be full anyway. Could we cancel? Well, yes, of course we could. But would we get our money back? Unlikely. There was no notice. It was hardly the sort of life or death situation that would convince an insurance company to pay out for. And how disappointed would the kids be? And, let’s be honest, me? Money aside, we’d been looking forward to the holiday for ages. I’d spent hours reading reviews on Trip Advisor and watching videos of the resort on YouTube. And, after a pretty tough year, I was really looking forward to a break from it all. Sun instead of the constant rain that the UK was still battling. All-inclusive food and drink instead of cooking, washing and cleaning. Days spent on sun loungers, in the pool, on the beach, in the sea, reading, relaxing. No stress, no worries, mon. Could I give all that up? If Dylan was properly ill, it was a no-brainer. We didn’t want to be somewhere without a doctor or put him at risk; plus it wouldn’t be a relaxing holiday anyway if he was ill. But what if it was just a one-off? Imagine if we cancelled the holiday, drove sadly home and Dylan was completely fine all week and never threw up again. We’d faced a similar-ish decision when Dylan was one (the other story) and both boys had been suffering from rotavirus – should we cancel our holiday to Lanzarote? Thank goodness we didn’t, because Finn threw up for the last time just before we left, and both boys were fine all week. Aaaaaaggghhhh, decisions, decisions!

Eventually, after watching Dylan for an hour or so and noting that he seemed fine in himself and didn’t have a temperature, we decided to bite the bullet and go for it. More decisions now, of course – did we tell the airline staff before the flight and ask their advice? Or would they refuse to let us fly in case we needed a doctor or passed the tummy bug to all the other passengers? If he was sick on the plane, could we pass it off as travel sickness? Could we feign surprise and act like he’d only just come down with something, or would Dylan argue and tell them it was the third (at least) time he’d been sick that day? What if he was sick in the check-in queue or security or at the boarding gate? Would they let us board? Would we sound convincing if we told them he always gets sick when he’s excited? Were we doing the right thing? And what were the chances of me getting to Jamaica without being sick myself? I’d already had to rush to the bathroom five times that morning, and it wasn’t looking quite so much like stress anymore…

In the end, we just had to go for it. Luckily, we hadn’t checked our cases in the night before as we usually do, so we were able to take out a change of clothes to put in the hand luggage (back to that other story again). Armed with wet wipes and sick bags (I collect them from planes, thank goodness!), we nervously packed our overnight things and made our way over to the airport. There was a long check-in queue, but we made it through unscathed. Security would have been quick if Finn hadn’t beeped when he went through the scanner and they hadn’t decided my bag was a good choice for searching. We made it through to the (revamped) departure lounge and quickly popped into Boots to buy some water (and those handy free plastic bags, just in case). All was fine. Dylan picked at the panettone and kept it down. It was just me who was rushing to the toilet every five minutes. Finally, we made it onto the plane.

It wasn’t exactly a relaxing journey. Somehow I found myself sat next to Dylan (I don’t think it was an accident, was it, Lee?). Ten hours sat next to a child who might puke at any second. I had several sick bags ready and kept thrusting one in front of Dylan’s face whenever his expression was anything but a smile. We simultaneously encouraged him to eat food in the hope that it would build his strength up and prove he was better, and panicked that he was eating too much and it would set him off again. Meanwhile, thank goodness it wasn’t turbulent, as I might as well have taken a sleeping bag into the delightful aeroplane toilet.

We made it to Jamaica without incident, thank goodness. We got through passport control quickly, our cases were some of the first off the carousel, and the transfer to the hotel was short and, mercifully, not too bumpy. We checked in and made it down to dinner – although it was now past midnight UK time, it was only early evening in Jamaica. Of course, Dylan and I just picked at our food, me all the while worrying that it would set him (or me) off. But it was fine. We went to bed pretty much straight afterwards, exhausted, although it took me a while to get to sleep with all the worry. We’d made it here but was that the end of it? I wasn’t feeling good, but I hadn’t been sick – would it kick off for me the next day? And would Finn and Lee catch it? Would we be able to enjoy our holiday or would it be ruined?

At six o’clock the next morning (my birthday, I might add), we were woken by Dylan calling from the bathroom again. Déjà vu. On the plus side, he hadn’t been sick. On the negative side, he had done something else, and he hadn’t quite made it out of bed before it started. Bleary-eyed (again), we cleaned him up, stripped the bed and threw everything into the bath. Clearly he wasn’t quite right yet. It didn’t bode well. Then, mindful of not waking Finn, we decided to go out onto the balcony. Of course, it had been dark when we’d arrived, so we hadn’t been able to see anything. But the view at 6.30am on my birthday kind of made up for the rude awakening. Maybe things would be okay after all. And if we had to be ill, what a place to be ill in.

 

Our Premier choice from now on

A little while ago, I wrote a piece on airport hotels. As far as I knew at that point, the only hotels at Gatwick where you could walk from your room to the airport itself were the Hilton and the Sofitel. If you look on any of the airport parking/hotel websites (we always use Holiday Extras), you'll see there is an abundance of hotels offering airport parking packages. The problem with these hotels is that they're all five to ten minutes away at least, and you need to get a shuttle bus to take you to the airport in the morning. This is a major problem if you have a particularly early flight, as most shuttles don't start until 4am at the earliest. That aside, the last thing you want to do when you've got two kids, four cases and eyebags the size of hand luggage from being up so early is try and squeeze everyone and everything onto a tiny, packed minibus. Those twenty minutes or so would be far better spent fast asleep than rushing, waiting around, hefting cases and trying to balance on the journey to the airport. Hence we've always opted for the on-site hotels for pure convenience. There are two main problems with the Hilton and the Sofitel, though. The first is the extortionate price. The second is fitting us all in the one room. We splashed out on a family room at the Hilton last time, which was lovely (see Airport hotel - heaven or hell?) but really expensive. Our usual option saw us sneaking one child in and squishing them into our bed with us - not a great recipe for a good night's sleep for anyone. The other option would be adjoining rooms - even more extortionate. Now I'm pretty tight with money when it comes to anything except holidays, but I still think it's worth spending out to make the start of your holiday smooth rather than stressful. However, it's hard to get the thought out of the back of my mind that the money we've just spent on convenience could have got us several meals out, with ice creams to boot. So imagine how excited I was when, on our way back from the airport in October, I noticed a Premier Inn. How long had it been there? I'd never noticed it before, but there it was, standing tall and proud, just next to the North Terminal. It looked like an easy walk from there to the airport itself - not under cover, maybe, but that was a minor issue. So, next time we were due to head to Gatwick, after balking at the usual prices of the Hilton and Sofitel, I decided to check out the Premier Inn - best decision ever. It was around half the price of what we usually paid (and that's forgetting the extra expense of a family room at the Hilton), and we managed to get a valet parking deal included that meant we only had to walk to the on-airport short-stay car park, rather than the usual shuttle bus to one of the long-stay parking areas. As with all Premier Inns, the room slept four, so we didn't have to worry about sneaking in a child, or everyone squishing into one bed. It was hard to find when we got there - we came out of the car park and had no idea which way to go. Unfortunately, we chose the wrong direction and walked for a fair old way before deciding to turn back. Once we'd found it, however, it really was only a very short walk between the hotel and the airport or car park, and it's probably no further away than either the Hilton or the Sofitel. The rooms themselves were typical Premier Inn - not quite as 'posh' as the H or S, but clean and comfortable, with everything you need. The check-in was a little odd, as it was done through a computer, but it was pretty straightforward - it simply printed your keys out for you. I can't comment on the food - the restaurant was packed in the evening, but it was easy enough just to walk into the airport and eat there instead. So, all in all, it seems like a bit of a no-brainer - all of the convenience for half the price. It will be Premier Inn all the way for us now - I just wish I'd noticed it sooner!