After lying on a beach for a week on the Greek island of Santorini, the train back to Wokingham was somewhat depressing.
The rush to get through the airport so I could hop on the Gatwick Express back to Wokingham, surrounded by the swarms of mask-clad holiday makers, wasn’t made any easier by the heat – I certainly wasn’t expecting 33ºC when I landed back in the UK at the end of last week.
Wokingham station was hotter than the beach I’d been lying hours earlier.
So why bother going away when the temperature has been rising at home?
Well, the sense of adventure and a change from my very limited view at home seems like a pretty good reason to me.
I get that for some people, the thought of going abroad might seem uncomfortable or even dangerous, but as my first holiday away without schoolteachers or my family, the atmosphere at the airport at 4am was one of huge excitement.
Yes, everyone was wearing masks on the plane but, let’s face it, that’s no different to stepping into a supermarket in town.
And the terminal is now complete with hand-sanitising stations and social distancing signs but other than that it all seemed relatively normal.
Walking down the aisle to get to my seat on the plane was a step back to normal life. People were more excited than nervous and, for the first time in a long time, Covid-19 was far from my mind.
Santorini was quiet.
There were still a few tourists wandering around; enough to create a good atmosphere, but not too many that we couldn’t find a table or get a seat on the local bus to explore the island.
Greece is popular right now and I can see why.
Santorini has had very few cases of coronavirus and so, with a nice view of the sea, we sat and ate souvlaki as the days rolled by.
Since lockdown in March, life has seemed pretty small and unadventurous but for six days in August I got a taste of Greece, and most memorably, I got a short return to normal life.
