Mmmmm! BAcon! – Off to Denver and Beyond with Aer Lingus and British Airways
The Cheyenne Mountain Resort
Index:
- A Conference… why not?
- Early morning New New Street, Aer Lingus EI263 London to Dublin
- A Dublin transit, DAA Lounge
- BA827 Dublin to London Heathrow
- The Hell of A Heathrow Transit, BA F Lounge
- BA219 – London Heathrow to Denver
- Staybridge Suites, Denver Tech Center and a road trip
- The Cheyenne Mountain Resort, Colorado Springs – THIS SECTION
- A road trip back to Denver, Crowne Plaza Downtown Denver
- Photographic Interlude: Downtown Denver
- Denver Airport, American Airlines AAdmirals Club
- BA218 Denver to Heathrow
- Heading Homeward
- Interesting times
Rapid Travel Chai kindly picked me up in the morning from the Staybridge Suites and we were off again, on the road to Colorado Springs. Now, in my time in trips to the USA, I haven’t travelled much on the roads – so this was a pretty new experience to me. The drive itself was quick, yet rather scenic. I’ll let you all judge with some pictures.
After a couple of diversions (including a very nice lunch), we reached the venue for BAcon – The Cheyenne Mountain Resort
Cheyenne Mountain Resort
South Colorado Springs
Cost: See Disclaimer.
We pulled up at the hotel, and went to check in. A few bloggers had already arrived (AAdvantage Geek said hello as did a couple of others who had arrived early). I was assigned a room in the Bear Lodge, which was a short walk away. After retrieving my trash from Rapid Travel Chai’s car, I went to scout out my room.
Just beyond reception
Restruant area
The lodge I’d be in
….and through this door…
The room itself is a double double – allowing me to use one as an extended dumping ground, the other to actually sleep on.
Beds
Work Area
Washbaisn outside bathroom
Bathroom area
The bathroom looked modern and clean, fully stocked with all the amenities one would need.
Now, whilst the room is nice, there seemed to be a distinct lack of power sockets. Whilst this place is designed for relaxation, I counted 2 accessible powerpoints I could run the laptop on in bed (because I had shifted to my UK weekend sleeping pattern – and thus was waking up at what felt like midday to me). Oh well – not the end of the world, but still a challenge I didn’t need.
WiFi was provided through the venue, with WiFi payable in the conference area (unless of course you had a WiFi network set up… or the antennas were really strong on your laptop)
However – this room had a feature than many other hotel rooms I’ve been in had not been in.
Now that’s what I call a view.
The beds were reasonably firm, so I got some reasonable sleep (if not for my dratted body clock), with some lovely views to wake up to.
However, the real reason I was here wasn’t for the views – but to network, meet, talk and learn.
Others have covered what they thought of it (See Just another points Traveller… and there maybe a sighting of me there), Pearls of Travel Wisdom (Three Parts – Part 1, Part 2, Part 3), Loyalty Traveller, Food Wine and Miles and MichaelWTravels – and I’m exactly the same boat – an excellent set of workshops, a lot of food for thought (some of which have gone into live already – others of which will be going soon including a new video channel… once I sort out some bits at base).
I was working believe it or not.
And then there was the time to relax and to talk about all sorts.
Mommypoints and LittleC Dancing the night away…
And one of our host – Mr Randy Petersen with a big sign. 😉
There were however an important lesson to take home from the whole event.
Friends don’t let Friends drink cheap Tequila.
Me? I know one thing about Tequila as summed up by the following song performed by Terrorvision.
(Terrorvision – Tequila (Mint Royle Shot Mix)
Three days went fast – when combining blogging, ideas and miles… it always seemed to. Soon enough it was time to check out where the incidentals were paid for, and I was on my way again…. with a little help from FlyGracefully…
Overall: The event was a great event, set in a welcoming venue. The facilities provided were indusive to a great learning experience as well as a relaxing atmosphere when it was needed.
Disclosure: Frequent Flyer Services kindly supplied a hotel room at the Cheyenne Mountain resort to me to assist in this visit. All opinions expressed within this trip are my own, represent my own personal thoughts and my observations during the visit.
I’d also at this point like to thank the staff at the House of Miles, The Boarding Area Team and Randy Petersen for putting on a great event, and for Rapid Travel Chai and FlyGracefully for putting up with me for 70 miles plus each. Both of you are stars that saved me… from Greyhound 😉