Aylesham to Gatwick by pre-booked airport transfer: route, timing and terminals

How an Aylesham to Gatwick airport transfer gets there

The first miles are the same whichever airport you are flying from: out of the village to the A2 and north-west towards Canterbury. The A2 skirts the city on its bypass and runs on to Brenley Corner, junction 7 of the M2. For Gatwick the car follows the M2 towards London, joins the M25 and turns south on the M23 for the airport.

Once the car is on the M2 it is motorway all the way. That keeps the drive fairly steady in the small hours, when early-flight pickups happen, and far less steady on a Friday afternoon in July.

Why the published time is Canterbury's

The Gatwick figure Express Travel Kent publishes is for Canterbury: typically 1 hour 15 minutes to 1 hour 45 minutes. Nothing is published for Aylesham, and this guide will not make a number up. The honest version is short: from Aylesham the car covers the A2 up to Canterbury before it is on the Canterbury route, so your trip runs longer than that range by the length of that stretch.

That is why your pickup time is settled with you instead of being read off a table. Give us your address and the flight time, and the time is set for that address.

On the M25 a Friday afternoon, or the first weekend of a school holiday, can cost an extra 30 to 45 minutes, and the M2 and M25 are often coned off overnight for roadworks, which is exactly when a 5am or 6am departure needs them.

Counting back from your departure time

Gatwick's own advice is to be at the airport two hours or more before take-off, and airlines add their own deadlines for check-in and dropping bags, so read both. Then count backwards, step by step.

Say the flight leaves at 7am. Walking into the terminal by 5am is the target, and the drive and a cushion come off that. We will suggest a pickup time; if you would rather sit airside with a coffee than watch the clock on the M25, ask for an earlier one.

• The departure time on your ticket
• Back two hours: the latest you want to be inside the terminal
• Back again by the drive: Canterbury's 1h 15m to 1h 45m, plus the A2 from Aylesham
• Back again by a cushion for night-time lane closures, a Friday or the first day of a school holiday
• That is the pickup time to agree with us

North Terminal or South Terminal?

Gatwick's two terminals are split by airline, and your booking confirmation says which one is yours. Tell us, and the driver aims for that forecourt from the start.

Arrive at the wrong one and you lose very little. The free inter-terminal shuttle runs day and night, all year, every few minutes, and the trip across takes about two minutes.

At the kerb: Gatwick's drop-off zones

Setting down happens on the lower level at both terminals; at North Terminal the zone lies between the Sofitel and the multi-storey. Gatwick charges for a brief, time-limited stop in these zones, to be paid by midnight the following day, with an exemption for Blue Badge holders. The free alternative is a stop of up to two hours in a Long Stay car park, which has a free bus to the terminals.

If an airport charge affects your trip, ask at booking how it is dealt with: car park fees and tolls met on the way can be added to a fare when the route involves them.

Passports and boarding passes travel best in a pocket, not a suitcase. The stop then takes a minute and the car can pull away.

Gatwick to Aylesham: the arrivals pickup

Coming home, we follow your flight and send the driver for the moment it really lands, and a delay you could not help costs nothing extra. Your driver stands in the arrivals hall holding a board with your name on it and takes the cases from there.

Gatwick wants drivers who collect passengers to use its Short Stay car parks, so the car is a few minutes' walk from arrivals rather than outside the door.

From touchdown you have 45 free minutes after an international flight, or 30 after a domestic one. Longer waits are charged at the standard rate, which we can give you when you book.

Home is the M23, M25, M2 and A2 in reverse. If you live in one of the newer streets of Aylesham Garden Village, where more than 1,200 new homes had been built by March 2025, a short note on finding the house helps after dark.

Choosing the car, and what fixes the fare

Choose the car for the cases as much as the people. A saloon suits four people with two big cases between them; an executive car the same four with up to three; an estate four with three or four; and an MPV six with four or more. Ask for child seats when you book.

The price is set for the whole car the moment you confirm. A jam, a closed slip road, a diversion, a 3am start or a bank holiday leave it alone. It moves only if the trip itself changes: stops you add, waiting past the free period, a big detour you ask for on the way, or car park fees and tolls along the route. Cancel more than a day before pickup and you owe nothing.