"How Many Hours of Travel for What Size Con" Topic

How many hours of your time are you willing to invest in travel (method doesnt matter, planes, trains or automobiles) to got to a:
1) small con (Huzzah, couple hundred people)
2) medium con (HMGS, couple of thousand people)
3) mega con (Origins 10k+ people)

for me:

1) 2 – 3 hrs
2) 10 – 12 hrs
3) 12 – 16 hrs

Within the UK only 1) really applies, otherwise you'd fall in the sea.

Well, I suppose you could get to 2) or 3) by travelling between Cornwall and Scotland, or the M25 at rush hour.

No more then roughly 5 hours for any size con. And a mega size con would probably be right out, bigger does not always mean better.

I would rtavel a lot further for a con that I knew friends were going to. So I would be willing to drive to a con in Toledo if I knew that some people were going no matter how small it was. It doesn't mean I would do it every time but I would be much more likely to if friends were there.

I would like to go to Salute some time and that would be about 12 hours of travel so there is some incentive because of the size.

Five hours for a regional convention.

For the Big three, Hcon, Cold Wars, and Fall In!. Whatever it takes. I once planned leave between Germany and School in California based on when Historicon was.

VR
James Mattes

I also only go to Fall-in, Cold Wars, and/or Historicon. It's roughly 2.5 hours to Lancaster, 1.5 or so to Gettysburg(when they were there). I wouldn't go further.
Peter

I regularly travel for 8+ hours to conventions – because they are the only ones close. I've driven 30+ hours to GenCon, and have sojourned to Enfilade! for 4 years which is 9 hours away. There don't seem to be other conventions which are closer.

5 hours to Kansas City or Chicago for Recruits or Little Wars is about it.

Terry

Well for me HMGS is a mega-con. Origins is for Wimps and Space Monkeys. I would drive six hours to a multi-day regional convention. I know this is not exactly the same topic but did we not just do this subject? I mean come on now. Why am I wasting my time here? Good question.

UK based. I won't usually travel more than actual gaming/attendance time spent there. This applies more to re-enactment etc events than wargames shows where I'm far too lazy to drive for more than an hour or so unless it is a whole weekend.

I'll spend weeks getting ready for a good WW2 dressing up bash though, and am happy to drive rather further.

I am planning on going to fall-in at about a 5 hour drive. I may go to historicon (I hear its in fredricksburg,va) at an 8 hour drive but only because I lived there for 7 years and all my friends are there.

I think there is a poll going already on this topic.
4 Hours drive is my limit.

Quality of the convention generally and my immediate company has more of an influence than the size of the convention.

As a vendor my average diustance to a medium (regional convention) was 12 hours and to national shows 14 hours. Since my open heart surgery, I tend to not travel over 9 hours even with help. Though in 2012, I may return to my old range due to necessity.

Another way to look at it is how many hours would you travel for a:

1 day Con.
2 – 3 day Con.
4 day or more Con.

Hours of travel being more important than distance, to me anyway. Just curious how others feel.
(If I had a private Lear jet and could fly wherever I wanted I would go to Cons in the UK all the time as it would only be a few hours away even though it is a couple thousand miles. Unfortunately my Lear is in the shop so I am limited to driving <VBG>.)