Europe 2017: Day #11 Don't Dream It's Over

Sunday, 13 August 2019

The last full day of the convention and Robyn decided to join me.  Though she planned for us to take a tram down to the harbour-front market before venturing out to the con site for a wander around.

The idea of visiting the market was a good one, the only trouble being that a lot of Finland (and that includes about half of the market) don't work on Sundays.  Lots of shops were shut and not a lot of market stalls open.  Robyn did ensure that I was fully aware of how good the market was when I wasn't there however.

Robyn turns to tell me what I've been missing

A wander back down the city streets of Helsinki to the train station and then we were off on another of the city's wonderful commuter trains.

Front entrance to Messukeskus

The convention centre was strangely quiet, which was most probably due to the reduced programming as well as the overall tiredness of the attendees.  As usual we kept running into various people we knew including a few other past Worldcon Chairs.

The three Worldcon Chair amigos: Perry, Mike Walsh, and Kent Bloom

We trawled through the dealers room, sat for a while in the fan lounge (saw George RR, with Stephen Boucher filling in as minder, being totally left alone for once), found Rose Mitchell and decided to hit the Terra Nova bar for a beer.  We were only there for about 5 minutes before we were surrounded by other fans - friends old and new.  But three beers was enough and we needed to pack for an early start the next day so it was back to the hotel.

And then back to the con site again for the Past Worldcon Chairs Party (properly known as the Old Pharts Party).  An early night beckoned and we left at 10pm.  Sorry to be gone, but anticipating the rest of the holiday.