Firefly

When, nearly a year ago, the Done the Impossible crew announced that they were going to throw a Convention on a Cruise ship, I was as skeptical as the next person how this could possibly work.

Having just come back from that event, I can say without a doubt that my skepticism was completely unneeded.

I’ll get to a play by play of the event itself in a moment, but first, I want to start with the below.

This was a fan event. Run by and for fans. Companies out to make money from conventions need to stand up and take notice. Not only was this event a spectacular success, but the organizers managed, in the end, to tip their small coffers out of the debt this event had put them into.

The Con was not without its hiccups, but most of those were due to venue restrictions. A few of the rooms couldn’t hold everyone. And I didn’t go to most of those events so I don’t know how cramped those rooms ended up being.

I can only imagine how much work went into the planning and execution of this event. I helped out at the event itself as a volunteer, but that was so very minimal compared to the work that the staff did. I would do the same, and more, in a heartbeat, should they decide they want to do this again.

The staff. I can’t say enough good things about them. They were friendly, personable, approachable, and always had a smile on their faces. They were busy, but they kept cool heads and showed a level of professionalism that some events couldn’t ever hope to achieve.

The guests were lovely, energetic, excited and just very happy to be there. They mingled with the fans outside of the Browncoat events for which they were scheduled to appear. If they had escorts, those people weren’t easily discernable from the fans.

The atmosphere was charged from the moment I walked into the Shindig hotel. Everyone was happy, despite the downpour that soaked them on the few feet one had to run to get into the hotel from the street.

We milled about the bar for a few hours, chatted, introduced ourselves to people we only knew by board names. Aussie Jen dragged the shy Aussies around the room so they could get to know as many people as possible. There weren’t as many people at the Shindig as I thought there would be, but most of the locals weren’t going to be arriving until the next day.

By morning, the rain had dissipated and we made our way on busses (something the Cruise staff had organized as a convenience for the attendees) to the pier. It was a fairly easy and painless check in, and I went in as soon as we were permitted to board (I got on about 11:30 am). I wanted to explore the ship, get my bearings, before lots of people arrived. (it didn’t help a whole lot as I got lost going to certain places for the first 3 days!) We weren’t scheduled to depart until 5pm, and we couldn’t get into our cabins until 1:30pm. But – they were providing lunch!

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