UK PonyCon 2017 was fantastic. Let's get that out of the way straight off. My favourite of the six Pony conventions I've been to, so huge thanks to everyone who worked so hard in making it so good.
This year's iteration of the convention was held in Bristol, at the University of the West of England (universally known as UWE, pronounced "Yoo-ee") Exhibition and Conference Centre. The theme for this year was "Wild West and Rodeo", so as you can imagine there was a very strong Apple Family presence. A more unwelcome presence was my cough, the entire weekend, though it was mostly kept under control by the consumption of vast quantities of mints.
This was my fourth UK PonyCon and sixth MLP convention overall, but it was the first time I'd had a travelling companion on the train – Snowkitten. (I know him better under another name, but Snowkitten is the one he used for the con book, so that's what he gets here!) After a quick yet important stop at Muffin Break at Birmingham New Street to get into the mood, we made it to Bristol Parkway on time at just before 2pm. There, we met up with Rorschfox, who I only knew through Twitter but Snowkitten had met before; he'd kindly offered to give us a lift to the hotel where all three of us were staying.
Once we'd negotiated Parkway's bizarre layout – seriously, for a relatively small station the place is a maze – it was a fairly brief journey to the Premier Inn on the Filton roundabout. We checked in and spent a little while chatting about this and that, and (among other things, not all pony-related) Rorschfox gave me a beautiful 4DE Flutterplush, which has always been quite hard to get in the UK, and a really nice card he'd asked Kelly Sheridan to sign with a little message to me while at BronyCon
After dumping our bags, we had a quick scoot(aloo) around Home Bargains to see what they had in the way of Pony. Reshelving meant there wasn't much, but GoH Big Spike was there for a tenner. We then had a decent enough meal (gammon steak in my case) at the Brewers Fayre adjacent to the hotel, and there was of course more chatting. We were slightly disappointed not to meet any other con attendees, but we knew some were getting in much later, and in any case that state of affairs would change.
We all felt we'd like a fairly early night, given that our plans required us to be up before dawn on Saturday morning. As happens irritatingly often, I couldn't get to sleep for ages, and let's just say that I failed the first part of the 6-2-1 Rule with a vengeance. At least I got some shut-eye. I can't imagine how people manage who share rooms with friends; I've always shelled out for a single room at cons, because I absolutely need peace and quiet overnight at my age!
Next time: rainbows, karaoke and Awesome Applejacks
Sorry to hear about your lack of sleep on the first night. It's something I also experienced; not sure if it was the bed, unfamiliar surroundings or just nervecitedness about the following day!
ReplyDeleteI always really enjoy reading these, and will look forward to the next one. :)
I'm choosing to put it down to the last reason. It's the most Pony-appropriate, after all!
DeleteAnd thanks! :) It might be a couple of days, since the Saturday report is considerably longer, but it's coming. :)
First thing I'll say is a really big thank you for posting these reports, which are a very nice way to keep some of the memories going! As I mentioned yesterday, I'm still not quite sure why I used the name "Snowkitten" instead of "Eliki" for the conbook, but there we are. :)
ReplyDeleteI was certainly very glad of the company, and it made a lengthy journey much better, and although it may not be much, the quick visit to the Muffin Break was one of many really nice memories from that weekend. I don't know... the actual convention was obviously very special, but there was also something about that Friday, which also had a lot of good memories. Even something simple like going in the Home Bargains, or the chat we all had in the hotel room, and so on.
Yeah, I had hoped your cough might, just might, have gone by the weekend, but sadly it didn't quite work out like that. *Hugs* As for the lack of sleep, I think it's true to say that a combination of nerves in my case, as well as excitement and the somewhat unfamiliar room all added up to about 3 hours sleep at most!