I'm Going To Fanfest

Over the weekend I booked my reservations to attend my first gaming convention in 10 years.  That's right, I'm going to CCP's Fanfest 2012 in Reykjavik, Iceland.  From 1994-2002 I was a regular attendee of gaming conventions, particularly GenCon (both in Milwaukee and Indianapolis) and Origins in Columbus, Ohio.  One year I even splurged and flew down to Atlanta to attend DragonCon.  So this trip will be my biggest, most expensive trip by far.

When I travel I always try to get into my destination city the day before events start.  I decided to take the opportunity to see some of Iceland so I signed up for the Golden Circle Express tour on Wednesday, which means leaving Chicago on Monday to catch the Icelandair flight to Reykjavik that arrives at 6:30 Tuesday morning.  And since I heard that if you attend the Party at the Top of the World that you should not plan on leaving the next day, I am taking a lot of aspirin with me and leaving on Monday.  I already talked with my boss and she doesn't expect me back in the office until the following Wednesday, which is good because I'm just a bit concerned about making my connecting flight.  If I miss it, I won't get home until sometime Tuesday morning.

I may have made a bit of a mistake with my choice of hotels.  I chose the CenterHotel Plaza as my hotel not only because it was available but because the hotel page lists the Plaza as the official Fanfest hotel where CCP staff visiting from offices outside Reykjavik as well as the gaming press will stay.  The CenterHotel Arnarhvoll is the closest hotel to the Harpa Concert Hall and Convention Center.  The walk from the Plaza is a nice distance as long as the weather cooperates, but if the weather turns nasty the walk will be miserable.  Also, I really didn't take into consideration dropping off my laptop before going on the Pub Crawl with a Dev.  Who knows if I'll have time to drop the laptop off at the hotel and go back on-site to start the crawl.  Heck, my tolerance for alcohol is down since I pretty much stopped drinking a couple of years ago so I don't even know if I'll be in shape to blog on-site even if laptop storage is not a problem.  But assuming that all works according to plan, staying in the same hotel as the press should be a good move.

I will probably have more to write about the trip as CCP announces further details in the days and weeks ahead.  But for now, I can say I'm going to Iceland.  Wow.