Need sleep...

Long haul flights suck. More later.

'Ere we go, 'ere we go, 'ere we go

The Big Day. Everything's packed (more or less) -- it looks like we're allowed carry-on luggage, except for when we aren't. Translation: Make sure there's room in my suitcase to stuff my backpack if it turns out I'm not allowed it. Check.

And we're off. Depending on how things turn out, my next post may be from swanky Hong Kong International Airport, or it may be from our hotel room in London, complaining about the heat and the hours of queueing and the jetlag. Won't that be grand?

Nice Timing

Well that's just peachy.

It sounds like the restrictions on hand luggage only apply if you're flying out of Heathrow, not flying into it like us, but the queues are going to be murder no matter what...

The Wonders of Modern Technology

Here's a bit of fun: if you have Google Earth installed, you can download these two Placemark files and open them to see exactly where we'll be in London...

The St. Giles Hotel
The Brentford Fountain Leisure Centre

Getting Started

Right, well it's a week before we leave, but it would probably be a clever thing to put our itinerary up online for the benefit of anyone who wants to check up on us:

Depart Auckland 15 August, 13:00
Arrive Hong Kong 15 August, 20:40

Depart Hong Kong 16 August, 00:35
Arrive London 16 August, 06:20

(I'm pretty sure all of those times are local time, so if you think those are long flights, they're actually longer...)

In London, we are staying at the St. Giles Heathrow Hotel.

We register for the event on the 17th. The event itself runs from the 18th to the 20th, and is hosted at the Brentford Fountain Leisure Centre. For more on the event, see the offical website.

Afterwards, we split up -- Richard and I stay until London until the 29th (we arrive in Auckland on the 31st, stopping in Hong Kong on the way back), while the rest of the team heads home straight after the event (some of them spending some time in Hong Kong).