London Stansted Airport
London, Capital of England
In the 1940's London Stansted Airport runway was built by US Air Force and was used during the WW2. In 1966 British Airport Authority took control and started plans to extend for increasing passenger numbers. On 5th June 1983 Space Shuttle Enterprise landed at Stansted drawing estimated 200,000 spectators turn up to watch.
This was shortly followed by another expansion costing £400 million starting in 1986 and was opened by the Queen in 1991. Another expansion came in 2007 costing £40 million to extend the main terminal. Just before Stansted's 20th anniversary in 2011, it received permission to handle Code F aircraft - meaning bigger, heavier and wider wingspan planes to you and me!
Getting there
Train: The station is only a 2-minute walk from the airport terminal. The Stansted
Express train runs 7 days a week and the train calls at London Liverpool Street, London Victoria and London Baker Street. A train to Liverpool Street Station will take roughly 50 minutes and cost up to £30.
Taxi: The airport provider is 24x7 Taxis and any journey in London is going to cost you money and time.
Bus: The bus station is a 2-minute walk from the terminal, starting early morning and finishing in the wee hours. Most services run into central London from which you can access the underground and train stations. Buses into central London will take around 90 minutes and cost around £10.
Parking
The biggest favour you can do yourself is to prebook airport parking, turning up on the day you will pay full price! Due to the lack of planning on the other half side, we turned up on the day and after following some terrible diversions we arrived at Stanstead's long-stay car park and took the 15-minute bus journey to the terminal.
Between October and May the long-stay car park is £21.50 a day reducing to £21.50 between May and September. Due to lack of planning on the other half side, we paid just under £65 for Friday morning to Sunday afternoon.
Top tip - take a photo of the area, colour, location or bus stop number, when you return all jet-lagged and tired you'll be able to find your car without dragging kids around aimlessly! Even better Google Maps have also designed a genius solution, open Google Maps, press the dot showing your current location, and press 'Save your parking'. You can also save notes, save photos, enter times and share the location with others. To find this spot later click into the search bar and it's there at the top of the list!
Amenities
Wi-Fi - as long as you register you can get up to 4 hours of free usage. After that up to 24 hours of wifi access is £9SSID: _stanstedairport
Now I wouldn't say there was a lot for kids to do, there are the usual changing facilities but not a whole host of entertainment.
You can visit the Escape Lounge available to all for £19.99 with complimentary food, drink and wifi - which to me seem like you already paid for it?
Good to know
Stanstead have a handy terminal guide and an interactive map that you can access online - there are a lot of gates but without using the app the airport is well signed. The map shows you where to head for check-in with your airline, Ryanair on the left, Easyjet to the right and others in the middle.
Stansted has a stand with free plastic bags for carrying liquids and some islands where you stop and re-arrange your luggage, dump rubbish or forbidden items and repack, this is located after check-in on the way to customs.
After security head upstairs you're led through duty-free, past the pricey shops and to a common area. There is seating in the middle for all but also in the various restaurants surrounding this area. There are also a few shops such as WHSmith. You may find one coffee shop at each of the 3 gates hubs but if you're looking for variety stay in the main terminal. The toilets are located to the right of the digital display screen - otherwise known as the big screen with flight info on!
Underneath the armrests, you'll find free charges, perfect for those who need a top-up or those like me who exhausted the battery juggling Sat-Nav, Spotify, airline apps and taking photos of everything.
There's a train - did I mention that? Or as they like to call it the Stansted Airport Track Transit System - catchy huh! Not the one that you can arrive from central London from but to get you to the gates. It visits the main terminal, gates 1-19 and gates 20-39 & 81 -88, if you need 40 -59 your walking! When arriving at Stansted you might have to take this to get back to the main terminal.
The automated passport control is an experience, do yourself a favour and read the instructions. Never have I seen so many people having to join the referred line, you'd be amazed how many people can't stand at the machine, have their passport open and the right way round, hold it flat - not just leave it there and finally take off their mask and look at the camera. I could feel myself boiling over with frustration watching the other half getting all three parts wrong!
