Looking For The Perfect Gym

Trying to sort the car crash that is my post-student finances, I discovered that I'd been paying for a gym membership for the last four months without realising. Oh well. So I have begun to reaquaint myself with Mr Jim Nasium. As a member of Fitness First, I can visit any of the FF gyms in London, which is quite cool, because they have loads.
Last week I went to the Brixton branch, but I didn't really like it because the weights machines are crammed quite close together. I like a bit of space in my gym. Plus there were too many people there for my liking at 9am in the morning.
So today I went to FF in Victoria, ten minutes away on my bike. Again, that was small, but it was really empty which was cool. Just me and two other people at 9am. I had a good workout, the press-ups are coming on, and I sweated like a pig in a blanket. Then I had a lovely, relaxing sauna, just me myself and I.
But it is surrounded by a building site. I thought it was quite unusual when one of the workers stopped his pneumatic drilling (no euphemism) to say hello to me, on the way in, and the way out. You know he was Jamaican right?
I'm one of those weird people who actually likes going to the gym. I really enjoy a good workout, once I can my phat ass there. The best gym I've been to is Cannons in the City. I had a corporate membership when I was with the FT. Oh halcyon days, I loved that gym. Went every lunchtime, and it only cost me £25 a month. To civilians it was £60-70.
FF is £40, but is like a council gym, it does what it says on the tin, and the gym floorspace is small and lack imagination. Ideally, I'd like a membership for somewhere like Holmes Place, where they have masses of space, all the high-tech equipment and a pool. One of my ambitions is to complete the London Triathlon. So I need to practice my swimming. Contrary to Sharron Davies worthless opinion, some black folk can swim, and are quite good at it. I happen to be one of them, but my sister is much better than me. She's an excellent, smooth swimmer. The only problem is the same one Oprah had. The hair. I won't start about black women and their hair, because that's a whole 'nother blog. But I have dreads/locs, and they are long. The caps dont keep out the water, which means I have to wash my hair every time I swim. Long. It takes me two hours to completely wash, condition, and retwist every single lock on my head. I can't do that every week, let alone aa few times a week if I'm swimming. I was discussing this issue with another dread-head the other day, and she told me about the cap she bought online. She told me the website, which I promptly forgot. And I don't have her number. I guess I'll have to go stalk her at her son's school in Brixton.
The other thing that I would need to do is run 10km, but at the moment my achilles is pleading for mercy after each run, so I need to get a physio to look at that for me. So the Triathlon is on hold for now.
I'm going to try FF Covent Garden gym next. They do dance classes, Brazilian and Streetdance. Watch this space.