Skip to content Skip to navigation

Worldcon Trip - Arrivals

Monday, August 7, 2017 - 22:57

This will be an irregular chronicle of My Summer Vacation, beginning in Helsinki, Finland. Seeing all sorts of online friends reporting late planes and missed connections, I have to count myself lucky at getting a non-stop flight (though we were delayed an hour taking off, so good thing I didn't have a connection to miss). I spotted several other Worldcon-bound fans in the waiting room for my flight, in some cases due to strategic use of the "Helsinki 2017" bright blue t-shirts, but in some cases because it was someone I actually knew (waves at David Peterson). The flight was wonderfully non-full, and far more comfortable than economy class typically is. (I swear that the seats reclined farther than usual, but this may be an illusion because they certainly weren't any farther apart than usual.) By a judicious use of half a sleeping pill and my audiobooks, I managed as much sleep as I normally do, which meant I woke up just about when they were serving breakfast, a couple hours out from landing.

Of course, landing was at 4pm local time. It's possible I would have done better to get less sleep on the plane and been more tired last night, but I'm not going to complain. I navigated the airport, customs, and catching the train into the city as if I knew what I were doing. The one glitch so far is that my planned roommate (Liz Bourke) called in sick, having come down with something at the conference on Byzantium in SF last week. (The tweets coming out of that conference made me a bit envious of those who attended, but one can't do everything.) I'm a bit sad, because I like using room sharing at cons as a way to get to know people I might not have spent time with before. It's always awkward offering up room space for those in last minute need because of issues around being choosy.

Anyway, after checking in at the Hotel Arthur, I went out for a long walk to get acquainted with the downtown, find something to eat (a light smoked salmon sandwith at the Kappeli cafe in the esplanade park), and generally get in enough physical activity to reset my body a little. It was one of those times where it would have been nice to bump into other fans and do some socializing, but I wasn't up to figuring out how I would manage that. Sleep was decent enough that I think I'm well on track to get through the jet lag.

The hotel has a complimentary breakfast buffet with some interesting (and occasionally cryptic) choices. I mostly settled on muesli with yogurt-like-substance and fresh mixed berries. Then took in a walk through the botanic gardens which back up on the hotel. I have a 10:30 date to meet some online friends for coffee, and after that I'll improvise. Maybe even take some time to put together notes for the panels I'm on, which I haven't had the brainspace to do yet.

Major category: 
historical