I enjoy writing about all sorts really. I love travel and am pregnant at the moment so expect a lot ...
I enjoy writing about all sorts really. I love travel and am pregnant at the moment so expect a lot of baby reviews to come. I also post on Dooyoo under the name Whizz11
Last weekend I flew to Amsterdam and I had the pleasure of flying out of LutonAirport, and I call it a pleasure because it really was!! If you want a relatively quiet airport with no queues, without the throngs of passengers you find at Heathrow/Gatwick, a few shops/restaurants and a convenient baggage reclaim and customs section then Luton Airport is the palace for you.
Luton Airport or London Luton Airport as it is now known is situated in Luton, Bedfordshire which is approximately 30 miles from London. It is an International airport although it generally flies to destinations within Europe and is the major hub for several low-cost
carriers.
The main reason I like Luton Airport is that it is so convenient to get to. Granted, I live fairly near it but I work in London and this past weekend travelled from London to Luton for my flight. I took the train from London Bridge (First Capital Connect on the Brighton line) to Luton Airport Parkway which took just under an hour but there are faster trains. Then they have shuttle buses outside the train station that take you there for free if you have a valid train ticket. This takes about 5 minutes and then you are there at the airport.
My husband drove and parked the car at Luton Airport Parkway station. For Friday, Saturday and Sunday the total cost was £6, a complete bargain as it was not in peak time. The airport itself is situated just off junction 10 of the M1 which is very easy to get to also. There is parking available at the airport but I think it is more expensive than parking at the station.
Luton Airport is the fourth largest airport serving the London area and is the fifth busiest airport in the UK. Like I said they have a lot of low cost carriers that use the airport. EasyJet is one of the big airlines there as well as Monarch Airlines, Thomsonfly and Ryanair. So, for weekend trips and city breaks it makes this airport very convenient and fairly cheap. You do find a lot of people going on package holidays from Luton or stag/hen weekends a lot of the time which make for quite noisy, eventful flights but as it's only short it's not too bad.
Luton airport is also a centre for business jets and Harrods run their executive flights, Harrods aviation out of Luton for all their rich customers.
We did turn up about 2 hours early for our flight on Friday but there was absolutely no one there, we were first in the queue and checked in in about 5 minutes, brilliant, no waiting, etc. We did not check in any bags as with Easyjet you have to pay £10 to check in bags which I don't agree with but that's a whole other review (not a big fan of EasyJet some of the time!) but the bag check in was fairly easy as well. Going through security was also hassle free. There were a few people in front of us so it maybe took about 5 minutes but that was it. They made us take our shoes off and we had to go through scanners but it was not a problem.
Security is upstairs and once you go through there are a number of shops and restaurants waiting for you. Beforehand though, downstairs, they do have places too which makes it nice if you are waiting for someone to arrive from a flight. The restaurants to name just a few are Burger King, Costa and Café Nero. The shops include a currency exchange (handy for last minute Euro's) a Marks and Spencer Simply Food, Tie Rack and WHSmith. Once you do get upstairs for ticketed passengers only there are more shops but not as many as Heathrow for example. There are enough to suffice but you would not want to get delayed at Luton airport (I was there for 4 hours once - don't ask - this is why I do not like Easyjet).
They have the obligatory Duty Free shop with some nice perfume and make up ranges, a Boots with mostly travel related items but good for last minutes purchases and a few nicer shoes such as Kurt Geiger, Accessorize, Monsoon and the Sunglass Hut.
The food is quite good upstairs too. The most exciting kiosk they have is a Krispy Kreme donut outlet, w perfect way to kick start your holiday as calories don't count on holiday. They also have a bar (this is where you will find the aforementioned stag/hen do's), a Starbucks and a Pret a Manger.
The gates are all located at the back so once you flight has been called to the gate you all proceed one way down a corridor and because the airport is not too big it doesn't take long to get to any gate, unlike Heathrow where sometimes you walk for about 20 minutes to the other side of London practically!! Luton only has one runway so everything goes from pretty much the same place.
On the way back from our weekend we landed at Luton fairly late but came through customs with no problems and from touchdown to back at the car probably took about 15/20 minutes in total. I would definitely recommend this airport to anyone looking for an easy convenient trip.
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Oct 16th, 2008
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