In what I called elsewhere earlier the least surprising announcement in UK PonyCon history, the convention has announced that it will be returning to Nottingham for the fourth successive time (2018-19-21-22) on 8th/9th October. The venue itself will also remain the same, the Nottingham Trent University building just north of the city centre.
I confess to mixed feelings here. While there's no doubt that the venue works, that the con's relationship with venue staff is very good, that the city is fairly central in the UK, that it has excellent transport links... I can't say I have all that much enthusiasm for Nottingham, and however many extra events are put on as the blog post (linked above) hints, that won't change. My problems relate more to the fact that I just don't much like the city itself. It is, for example, the only place I've ever had an entirely sleepless night due to constant noise outside my hotel until four in the morning.
There's another aspect, too. For its entire existence from 2004 until moving to Nottingham in 2018, UKPC moved around the country. It never stayed more than two years in one city, and usually not even that. It made the con a great opportunity to explore somewhere new, it stopped it feeling samey, and perhaps most importantly it meant that people who lived too far away one year could hope that it might be closer in the future. Maybe I'm being unreasonable there, since people in places like the US will even travel thousands of miles sometimes to get to cons.
I actually feel quite uncomfortable posting all this, since after all it's a great privilege to have a Pony convention within reach at all – millions of people don't – and an even greater privilege that it's a con that is consistently popular, enjoyable and very well run. Barring my issues with the city it's in, I loved it last year and indeed have greatly enjoyed all four Nottingham PonyCons. I also don't want to downplay the importance of not overworking the staff, and it undeniably is a lot more work to establish a new host. And if I'm truly honest with myself, if I were the one making the decision then I'd probably have stuck with Nottingham too. I'm just a little sad that something unique and (to me at least) special and highly appealing has gone, maybe forever.
Right now it is far, far too distant for me to say whether I'll be able to go to UK PonyCon 2022. Even aside from the wider situation, and after the last two years who knows what that will be by October, I simply don't know yet what my personal circumstances might be by the autumn. There's Griffish Isles in May first, and it's just possible I may choose to go to that instead simply for the change of scene. But without a doubt it is UK PonyCon that has the greatest hold on my affections.
Regardless of any of my less enthusiastic comments here about the location, I absolutely wish UKPC 2022 to be the enormous success that UKPC 2021 was. It's a wonderful convention run by wonderful people about a wonderful franchise. It supports a wonderful charity, too. That's worth a lot.
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