Debconf6 day -7: Arrival

I did not know that I will be moving to UK when I bought my Debconf 6 aeroplane tickets. For that reason my journey to Debconf 6 started in Cranfield, UK. I had to spend 40 (!!!) pounds for a return train ticket to Stansted and additional 50 pounds for a return aeroplane ticket from London (Stansted) to Riga.

Additional feature of this fact is that I had a night to spend in Riga where I had to be awake (as I came to Riga late at night and had to be back at the airport at 5 in the morning) and a few days to spend with my family on the way back.

On the way to Riga I used Ryanair and now I can compare experience with their fiercest competitor - EasyJet. The conclusion is that I liked Ryanair experience better: there is a bit less shouting announcement and less organisation in general, which somehow worked just as good, but felt better. We will see how they will handle my request to add a bike to my return ticket when I will be coming back from Debconf.

Riga was a lot of fun - ate a bunch of good local food in Lido, spend some value time with my girlfriend (or ex-girlfriend, I am not quite sure about that) and got a taxi back to the airport. Nostalgia fixed up.

From Riga to Mexico I was flying with KLM via Amsterdam. KLM is not a low cost airline, so you get the food and drinks for free on the plane. I already got used to this service not being there for most EU airlines in the last few years. The service was very good and the food was fun, but what I like the most was the Amsterdam airport - a very large and comfortable place. There was no free WiFi, but there were some free power sockets which helped me to spend my 8 hours there in with a bit of comfort. The transatlantic flight was fun: several meals, a lot of sleep, the King Kong movie (utter crap, the effects are only interesting thing and only from a professional point of view), nice view of Iceland mountains covered in snow.

Then we took a taxi from the Mexico City airport to the Debconf place. My memory of the trip is very episodic: Heavy rain. Got into wrong car, had to change. Small green taxis overtake us. We overtake a train that runs in the middle of the motorway. A lot of ads of large people in suits standing with a smile and welcoming hands. Politicians. :P Mountains. We had to pay ~190 peso for the road tools in addition to the 1900 peso taxi charge (for 7 people). Two hours in a taxi. The driver only knew about the Oaxtepec aquapark (which is also here). The security guards at the park entrance know about Debconf place and point the way for the driver. After a kilometre another security checkpoint did the same again. Hotel reception. Gunar with his wife there.

This is a resort. Four different swimming pools (including one with 10m diving tower), several hotels, shops with swimming stuff and junk food, mango trees, several restaurants, conference places, football and basketball fields, lots of tourists relaxing. Bunches of cats around in the night.

In total I left Cranfield place at 9.00 GMT on the 5th of May and arrived to the Debconf place at around 21:00 CDT on the 6th of May which amounts to 41 hours of travelling. Ugh, no wonder I felt like a zombie at the dinner.

The dinner was fun - a lot of ~20 people wander into the restaurant an hour before closing, argue about what to order for around an hour and then start eating. We left almost 1.5 hours after the place was supposed to close. And then I got to my room (the door had to be opened via security as my roommates were out somewhere) and crashed within minutes. The last thought was something along the lines of 'Now that was a fun 48 hour "day" ...' :)