Kent, I suspect PPL letterpress will be a serious draw for you - you might find yourself totally engrossed in it - this is as much a warning as anything else! :-)

BTW, when will we have more schedule details? Specifically I'm wondering about Sunday. I remember what Kent said happened to him last year (or was it the year before?) and I'd like to time things just right.

hhp

BTW, I was just checking hotel pricing, and both Orbitz and Expedia are actually showing the Nikko at a lower rate than the conference "special"... :-/ It's $129 per night for a Queen room instead of $139.

Better have a talk with them about the swindle.

hhp

So what's a quick and cheap way to go between San Jose airport and Union Square? Is it a big advantage to fly into SFO instead?

hhp

Oh, useful elaboration on the rooms! Maybe put that on the site, since $10 a night extra seems totally worth it - for one thing a larger room can take two people.

> They were designed for flight crew

Noting that for most Japanese people the petite Queen will seem huge! :->
(I'm not talking about lack of height, but Tokyo cramping.)

San Jose is looking bad, then. The thing is, affordable flights from Burbank (much easier for me than LAX) only go SJ... So I might just drive (solo or con otros font-fanaticos).

hhp

Tamye's right. Speaking as somebody who lived there until recently, you absolutely don't want to fly into San Jose, unless you're going to go up to SF with somebody from San Jose.

Now it is true that Adobe HQ is about 5 minutes from the SJ airport, so if you know folks from Adobe, there are possibilities there. But otherwise it's a lousy idea.

T

OK, thanks.
If I fly I'll probably just go into SFO and pay the $80 difference. Normally I'd drive, especially since I'd have a car there. I'm from LA, you see. :-) But in this case there's the daily $15-25 valet charge at virtually any hotel in the Union Square vicinity, so...

hhp

I'm in.

Tiffany, see you front and center. Dang! I'm out of it for
one weekend and the FontLab workshop is tapped out!

Kent: Letterpress vs Stone. Maybe you can get letterpress closer
to home. Can you get Sumner Stone? At least this was my logic.

Hrant: CalTrain will get you from one to the other. It is far less than
$80, and free shuttles run from SJC to the station every 10mins,
and the other end drops you at 4th and King in SF.
http://www.caltrain.com/caltrain_map.html

Randy, are you from NY or SF? :-)
CalTrain looks like an option, although the walk from the station to Union Square might be somewhat too legionnaire for me, con maletas - it depends on the elevation changes, I guess.

hhp

As one of the Bay Area Typophiles, I'd be happy to make a couple of trips to the Oakland airport to pick people up and bring them to the Nikko. But not during the day Thursday, as I was one of the lucky ones who got the FontLab workshop . It paid for me to have been up in the middle of the night, I guess.

Awesome... I have a month and a half to have another dream about Hrant and hone my f-word skills.

You can take MUNI from the Caltrain station to Union Square. It's $1.25. although I think you can get a three day tourist pass for something like $7. Here's a map of the N Judah line (those directions are for going in the opposite direction though). You'd probably want to get off at Powell Street station.

The elevation is pretty flat though if you really want to slog it.

Graham, thanks! It now seems I might have a ride from San Jose airport to the conference (not Adobe, but Ultrafonts), but if that falls through the Muni will certainly save me some slogging.

hhp

I think it's pretty easy to go from the Oakland airport to SF. You take a little shuttle to the station, then get on a train that goes directly to SF. The whole trip costs about $6, I think.

So you guys are telling me Oakland is better than San Jose? Because cheapo SouthWest flies to both (just not SFO).

hhp

Way better. That is, way closer (by about an hour, driving -- of course that's nothing to someone in Los Angeles...).

And don't forget my offer to shuttle people from Oakland to SF if the timing can be worked out (i.e., if I can do it during lunch or after hours).

I do remember the offer - highly generous - so much so that I'd feel bad unless there was a few of us you could bundle. My plan is to get there by noon Thursday, and leave early afternoon Sunday*. Anybody else in one of those slots?

* Depending on the conference program action around then.

hhp

I should also repeat the caveat that I'll be in the workshop all day Thursday, so that slot is out, unfortunately. It would be a pleasure to chauffeur you, HHP -- too bad about the timing.

It's OK - and next time you'll be in LA let me know!

hhp

For all of those who are cheap and/or poor like myself and the price of the Hotel Nikko is keeping you away (even with the great reduced rate), in a quick bit of research I've found a few hostels in very close proximity to the Hotel Nikko from this site: http://www.hostels.com/us.ca.sf.html

The HI-San Francisco-Downtown (Union Square) is one block away from the conference and is $24/night for the very minimum of necessities and the Adelaide Hostel/Hotel isn't too much further. I can't vouch for either of these, but I'm almost positive that this is how I'll be staying in the city.

It'll be my first TypeCon, I know I'm not usually very vocal on the forums, but I read from them every day and I'm really looking forward to putting faces with all the names and meeting lots of people.

Seeya there!

Andy, are you driving up?

hhp

Hrant -- I think I might fly to Sacramento to see some friends and take the train from there unless if there is indeed a SoCal Typophile carpool...

Obviously I should put in a showing.