Left for Washington National Airport (Reagan) at like 6:10 AM. The walk to the metro was not that bad. It took a while like 30 minutes to get to the Continental check in and it went very quickly, since no one was in line at all. Then I got to the security line and there were about fifty to seventy-five people in each line. There was a guy that was behind me that had a 7:10 am flight and it was like 6:52 am. I let him get ahead of me, since I had over an hour to kill. Hopefully he made his flight, since he seemed really worried about it. I would suggest tha tnext time he might leave a bi earlier to make sure he makes his flight.
While waiting for the plane I ran into three Refresh DC people. It was the guys from Politico (Ryan, Andrew, and ??). They were going to be on the same plane from National to Houston and then from Houston to Austin as me. Both flights were uneventful. The only thing that was odd was the woman next to meet on the second flight was taking her thin red licorice and tying it into knots before eating it. The other thing was the couple behind me that were both snoring before we even left the terminal gate.
Once we landed it only took a little while to get luggage. While I waited I went over to the information desk and asked them where I should go to catch the 50 cent bus. The lady told me to go to the center island and head down to the column that has the “4” on it and wait for the bus. I got lucky again this year by only having to wait like 10 minutes to to catch it.
The trip from the airport to the Hampton took about twenty minutes. As last year at the first stop on the trip into Austin we stopped and thy changed bus drivers. It was about the same time I took it last year. I guess the first driver must have started at 6:00 am, since we were stopping there at like 1:00 pm.
Got dropped at off at the corner of 6th and Brazos. On my way to the Hampton I stopped at the “Taco Shack” for a chicken burrito. I got it to go so I could have it over at the Hampton and sit in the lounge and relax. When I got there my room was ready so i was able to drop off all my stuff and grab my computer. Took computer down to the lounge and ate while I checked e-mail, blogs, and twitter.
While checking Twitter I started see a great deal of messages about people being getting stuck in Dallas do to snow(?). A bunch of the Brits are stuck there, since none of them have there licenses with them or do not have one to begin with. A few people here were taking about renting a car and driving to Dallas to pick them up.
This is my SXSW adventures so far.
Sounds like a fun time. I like the camaraderie of driving up to Houston to pick up standard SXSW. Erin Kissane of A List Apart and Jackson Wilkinson were tweeting about their troubles. Jared Goralnick is apparently stuck in Indiana.
Dude, I’m stuck in DC till tomorrow morning. My 6am flight out of national got canceled and every other flight to anything close to Austin is booked with SXSW’ers. Eat some bbq and drink a glass of wine for me. 😉
@Russell Having a good time so far. Making an early night of Saturday night, since we lose and hour and my ankle/foot is bothering me and I need to be ready for bowling Sunday night to represent Refresh DC.
Jared actually never made it out of DC. He got up really early Friday morning so he could get on the stand by list and it paid off.
@Justin Glad you made it down to SXSW finally. Nice seeing at lunch, even though it was from across the room. I’ve had the BBQ, just no wine yet. I might have some at some point, just not at the bars.