How am I going to get to Loncon? And where will I stay?

[kissdbyfire]

Wait a second, darling, are you back in London? :wideeyed: :thumbsup: :kiss:

Yes, dearest! Well, sorta. Back and forth for now but I'll be there then. Did that make any sense at all? :uhoh:

Sleep deprivation's a pain in the neck! :)

Kissd! Welcome back :D

Thanks sweetie! :D

[Arataniello]

There are no longer storage lockers at railways stations in the UK. There is a left luggage service, but it is basically just a manned room with loads of shelving, and you give them your luggage to look after. I only ever use this service for a few hours at a time, and it is probably rather expensive for long term storage (ie overnight and longer time periods).

[Zoë Sumra]

Update on official con hotels, for those intending to splash out on such:

When the booking service goes live on 2nd January, it will allow you to book any hotel in the ExCel vicinity and beyond. We have blocks of rooms reserved for Loncon use in seven of them: the Crowne Plaza, the Novotel, the Aloft, the Ramada, the Ibis and the Ibis Styles, plus the Marriott Docklands.

• The Marriott Docklands is a five star hotel over two miles away, near Canary Wharf. It is the only five star hotel that has reserved rooms for us.
  
• The Crowne Plaza, Novotel, Aloft and Ramada are four star.
  
• The Ibis and Ibis Styles are three star.
  

There are four budget hotels on site in which we do not have room blocks, and a number of extremely small hotels, ditto.

The Aloft is the only one with a physical connection to the ExCel. It will not be available to book in the normal way. If you (or your chosen roommate) need a room in it for mobility or other accessibility reasons, contact the Services team: if you want to be considered for a room in it despite not having access issues, there will be a ballot for remaining rooms. Information about the Aloft ballot will be available closer to the time on the website.

All the con hotels' rates include breakfast. The Aloft's is continental breakfast only - it will do English breakfast for an extra charge.

All the con hotels have a number of rooms cited as being accessible: these will be tested in the next few weeks. IIRC the only one that has baths in accessible rooms is the Novotel: the others have showers. All UK hotels accept assistance dogs as a legal requirement. If you are staying in the Crowne Plaza, Ibis, Novotel or Ibis Styles and have walking difficulties, the easiest way to get to con central will be to take the DLR one or two stops to Prince Regent, given the length of the Excel (the Ramada, like the Aloft, is at "our end" of the ExCel").

If you want to bring a pet dog that is not an assistance dog, the Novotel takes all dogs and the Aloft takes dogs under a weight limit (IIRC fifteen kilos). You may not bring dogs (except assistance dogs) into the con.

Several of the hotels have suites that are suitable as family rooms: others have rooms with connecting doors. Talk to the individual hotel prior to booking if you need two connecting rooms. The Aloft does camp beds for children, which could potentially turn a four person suite into a five person suite.

[Adz of CCAA]

Thanks for that info, Eloisa! :)

[Lily Valley]

Air bnb is high quality all over Europe. Just don't fall into the trap of staying in West London because everything over there is expensive.

London is only expensive if you do it badly. Don't book near the Excel as it will be dead expensive. If you stay South East you are golden. If you spend 300 notes on a night out, well, you're my sort of person. I look forward to going large!

London is lovely because you can stay well out and still be somewhere central within half an hour. Just don't get conned into staying somewhere well expensive and you'll be alright :)

Haha! Con weekend I do want to book a room nearby for convenience. I had already looked at the Aloft, but new info tells me it may not be available. I haven't even looked at anything near 300. Bet it's nice.

1. I'm not sure, of course you can always store your stuff at my house. Might not be that convenient as you will have to get it there, but depending where and when you fly into I might even pick you up from the airport.

Pebs, thanks. I was thinking about offering an airbnb host some cash to hold my suitcase before I came back to stay the week. If I take you up on your offer, I'll bring it to you. You're the best.

I found a whole flat near excel (2-bedrooms) for $165/night US. A couple of rooms too for $65/night each. If more of the TTNE comes out, we'll share. I'm just trying to put a budget together.

Lunch here costs me $5-$7 if I get it to go, and it's delicious. I'm going to plan on triple my daily vacation budget for here and I think I'll be ok.

[Battle Kitten]

Is this a thread for finding roomies? I am thinking of going and booking into the Marriott.

[Lady Olenna]

Is this a thread for finding roomies? I am thinking of going and booking into the Marriott.

Only if you take your loving little sister....

:leaving:

[Battle Kitten]

I'd like to bump this thread because I would like advice on how to get from the Marriott to the convention.

[Zoë Sumra]

I'd like to bump this thread because I would like advice on how to get from the Marriott to the convention.

From 6am to 12.30 midnight, take the Docklands Light Railway from Poplar (across a road from the Marriott) heading towards Beckton. Get off at Prince Regent station. Reverse to go back - get on a train heading for Tower Gateway.

Outwith those hours there's a night bus that runs from the Excel to Poplar. I will check what number bus it is when I have a computer in front of me rather than a phone.

[Arataniello]

I'd like to bump this thread because I would like advice on how to get from the Marriott to the convention.

Here is a longish and rather non-specific post I made a couple of months ago.

http://asoiaf.westeros.org/index.php/topic/83190-loncon-3-2014/page-14

Eloisa's is much more specific to your particular enquiry.

Worth looking at the Transport for London website for anyone looking to get around London -

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/

[Tyria]

You might want to check out Iceland Air too. We're going from Halifax to Reykjavik, staying over night, flying to London and back to Reykjavik, staying for four days, then back to Halifax. All for about $1000 each for all the flights.

[Angalin]

You might want to check out Iceland Air too. We're going from Halifax to Reykjavik, staying over night, flying to London and back to Reykjavik, staying for four days, then back to Halifax. All for about $1000 each for all the flights.

I would like to subscribe to your newsletter.

[Knight of City of Bayonne]

From 6am to 12.30 midnight, take the Docklands Light Railway from Poplar (across a road from the Marriott) heading towards Beckton. Get off at Prince Regent station. Reverse to go back - get on a train heading for Tower Gateway.

Outwith those hours there's a night bus that runs from the Excel to Poplar. I will check what number bus it is when I have a computer in front of me rather than a phone.

This is very helpfull, thank you, as I am also staying at the Marriott. The lightrail will be fine to get to the con, but is it safe to assume that there, in addition to the bus, are cabs at the con site for well after midnight returns to the hotel?

[Arataniello]

If not actually at the conference centre, there are hotels right by the conference centre from which it should be easy to arrange taxis as needed.

[Zoë Sumra]

Arataniello's right - the biggest collection of taxis is to be found at the west end of the conference centre (i.e. not the one the con is at, but it's not a long walk).

The night bus is the N551, running every half an hour: it takes nine minutes to get from the west end of the Excel to Poplar.

[Padraig]

You might want to check out Iceland Air too. We're going from Halifax to Reykjavik, staying over night, flying to London and back to Reykjavik, staying for four days, then back to Halifax. All for about $1000 each for all the flights.

Westjet has rather randomly started flights between Halifax and Dublin here. Not hugely helpful, although Dublin isn't that far away from London I suppose.

[Tyria]

Westjet has rather randomly started flights between Halifax and Dublin here. Not hugely helpful, although Dublin isn't that far away from London I suppose.

Yeah, I checked into that, but the flights were significantly more expensive. If we took Westjet, we'd also have the cost of getting from Dublin to London. With Iceland Air, we are essentially flying from Halifax to London, but with a few days stopover in Iceland at no extra flight cost.

Plus, we're totally splurging and spending a couple nights at the Blue Lagoon :) . I've wanted to go there ever since I first heard about it 20 years ago or so.

[Knight of City of Bayonne]

Booked on United Airlines. Now to decide if I bring my Taylor guitar. :frown5: It is known, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YGc4zOqozo

[fitheach]

Hiya! For places to stay try airbnb.com.. I looked up the Canary Wharf area (close to where the Con is located) and the price for a bedroom in someones flat will run between $40 to $70 a night, or you can rent an apartment for around $135 a night.. I've used airbnb a few times, I really prefer it to staying in a hotel.

[Angalin]

For some reason, Air Canada's prices for the dates I was looking at just dropped about $200. If any of you are looking at flying out of Toronto, this might be a good time to book.