Every holiday, however long (or short), has to begin somewhere and only once we had arrived at Gatwick Airport and checked in at the Sofitel in the North Terminal did our Norwegian break really start. Having received some travel vouchers from my uncle and aunt the previous Christmas we decided to upgrade from our normal Premier Inn type of accommodation with the stay at the Sofitel. The hotel is very 'international' and probably, like ourselves, most people are here for one night only either before or after a flight. We opted to eat in the North Terminal itself rather than the hotel which just seemed way too busy. The Nicholas Culpepper however, despite being in the terminal, was far quieter and probably saved us a fair few quid as well. The food was never going to be gourmet but the pub grub was served up quickly by friendly staff and was more than adequate for us. With our flight booked to depart from the South Terminal at 0920 on the Saturday morning we were up fairly early to collect boarding passes, drop off the bags and grab some breakfast before take off. Given our destination we also picked up a couple of bottles of wine from the Duty Free for what will be less than a couple of glasses of wine in Norway! Sadly we had longer on the aircraft than expected as shortly after boarding our Boeing 737-800 the captain announced a short delay due to loading baggage. Not too much later he announced a further delay of 60 minutes or more due to poor weather . . . . . 90 minutes later than scheduled we were on the runway ready for take off. Next stop, albeit for just one night, is Oslo the Norwegian capital.