OK, so what are we thinking here? Will there be another Harbour Lights Reunion? Where and when? Any rumors? Any thoughts?

ed(If this is a new or experimental format, I really don't like it.)
As for the question -
The latest rumour from the previous deleted topic, placed it in Florida based on a BonnieJean saying, 'I know something, you don't know'. Or might that be a Regional?
I'm out of the loop, so let's here it from all our connected collectors.
When is Bill's first appearance of 2003?
John weren't you in El Cajon before Christmas?
Bob

OK, I've reverted the layout to the tried and true one. Just checking to see if anyone is paying attention.

I think the FL hints to BonnieJean may be about a Regional in the planning stages.

Yes, I was in El Cajon last month. Didn't get any hints or rumors. (It was a Holiday Party.)

If there were to be a Reunion in 2003, it would have to be well along in the planning stages by now.

St Auggie or Daytonna Oct 2004.

At least that's what I'd do!

Maybe a week or two after that would be better....

Daytona Beach the 3rd to 4th week in October. No chance of a stray hurricane, temeratures in the 70-80 degree range and normally sunny weather. Daytona has the hotel rooms and St Augustine does not. Daytona is also more centrally located to Amelia Island, Old St. John's River Light, Mayport Light, St. Augustine, Cape Canaveral and two far off ones Cedar Key and Jupiter.

Rich

I think Houston would be a great place. We could see lights from Sabine Pass to Mexico. We are the 4th largest city in the US so space is no problem. We have NASA which has a lot of SPACE! We could have a few AstroNuts running around talking about the new light in the sky. Plus, we can handle special "space cases" who only see lights going round and round.

Chuck aka Head Space Case
Space City USA

Time= Sept or Oct 2004

Location= Long Island, NY or San Francisco, CA

These are my choices/guesses! Hopefully!!

If I was to put in a vote I would go for some place that had a lot of lighthouses that I had not visited, or someplace that offered an opportunity to visit lighthouses that were normally inaccessable. Based on that criteria my choices would be:

New England, definately not a shortage of accessable lighthouses, and we have not been there.

Great Lakes, also not a shortage of lighthouses, and also never been there & done that.

Southern Florida, with maybe a cruise of the off shore lighthouses, and Dry Tortougas.

A long shot would maybe be Victoria Island BC, it looks like there are a lot of lighthouses that could be seen on a nice cruise, with maybe multiple stops or stayovers.

No matter where though we would probably attend since we had such a great time at our first reunion in Baltimore. As the Nike "swoosh" implies, "just do it".

San Francisco would be awesome!!!!!!

Most definitely!

I'd go to San Francisco in a heartbeat! Lots of side-trip opportunities up and down the coast and around the Bay!

San Francisco.... LOVE IT LOVE IT
Ruthie

That would be a great place to go North and South from...
AND 1/2 way to tag on Hawaii!
Bob

Two more good sites could be Virginia Beach/Norfolk or Seattle.

I think San Francisco would please everybody but the diehard Great Lakes crowd.

It has everything you'd be looking for in a place for the Reunion.

Dennis

When - Late September or early October 2004

Where - 1) San Francisco
2) Seattle or Vancover
3) Great Lakes

OK you guys. It's time to share the wealth. You've already had a reunion on the West Coast, a reunion in New England and a reunion around the Nation's Capital. It's time for one in either the Great Lakes or the South. The Southern lighthouses sell out the fastest and the greatest amount of lighthouses are in the Great Lakes so either place would be better then someplace that's already had a chance to host a reunion.

Rich

I would prefer a Great Lakes area reunion to one on the west coast. If not the Great Lakes, then Florida.

Bob

If my memory serves me right, wasn't the Great Lakes 2nd in the running last time. Now here we go again !!!! Always the bridesmaid, never the bride!!

Outside the Chicago or Detroit areas, where's a good convention site in the Great Lakes
that can support the thousands of HL lovers who would want to attend? Tampa, Jacksonville
or Daytona (especially in February) (NASCAR and lighthouses, what a combo!) would be nice.
Hoston's OK, but I'd go with Galveston. Believe it or not, Biloxi/Gulfport has a large convention
center too, not to mention casinos by the dozens. Any place is better than waiting.

What is available in the GL area depends very much on how HL decides to handle another Reunion. One story was that they would get out of the hotel business, and the Reunion package would be exclusive of room. You would choose your own hotel, possibly from a list they would get special rates from.

If this is the case, Mackinac is the prmier place to go. Much to do, all sorts of hotels and such, just not one with 500 or so rooms available. Downside would be airfare for some, upside would be ability for many to travel by car.

What people forget is that there are 5 Great Lakes. Everyone automatically presumers Lake Michigan. While this would be my first choice of the GL, there are possibiities in other locations. How about Milwaukee or Door County? (Door County would have same problem as Mackinac with hotel size.) Go up to Lake Superior coast. How about Duluth? Lots of possibilities. All these areas would be great in Sept/Oct time frame.

Though I would love to see a GL Reunion, history tells us it probably won't be so. Given that, SF is still the nicest choice I have seen listed.

Dave

From another practicality standpoint, San Francisco has many area airports with pretty cheap airfares to choose from - lot's of competitive airlines flying into the area.

Fred Kuhlman wouldn't have a big commute. For me it would be about a 13 hour drive + stops so 2 days.

Hey, lets not discriminate against us Texan’s just because we’re a little lighthouse poor down here, compared to all you lighthouse rich states up north there. After all we do have some history here, what with the North and the South fighting and all. There are many cool stories to tell around the fire at night that happened right here in Texas. I’ll bet you all have never heard about Pecos Bill and the haunted Light House of the Gulf Coast. Plus we have a missing Fresnel lens right on Matagorda Island where the rebels hid it during the war. It has never been found to this day, not to say many haven't tried. So do you feel lucky? All you need is a metal detector and mosquito/snake repellant (heavy on the snake repellant), what day that would be for everyone.

Chuck

Of course I totally agree with Chuck on the Texas location. He's not kidding about the snake repellent though. Maybe we want to hunt for the lens in the winter when "Texas finest" are snoozing! Terry

Chuck and Terry
You guys make a great case for a Texas Reunion!

Bob

Even San Antonio is possible. I've driven around a town and seen so many lighthouses used as building features. One mini-storage firm has alight appended to every office.

I'm going to be the skeptic here. I predict no reunion this year or next. I just don't see it happening until the economy picks up and the collectibles market becomes a little healthier.

Hummm.

I think rich and Digger said it best (Great Lakes & Florida), however Bill is on to something (no reunion).

With the current economy, collectible bust, looming war, terriosim and everything else you wish to put in the bag, a reunion around the corner does look doubtful.

It will be interesting to see how this plays out!! :rolleyes:

Nancy said at the North Georgia Beacon Brigade meeting tonight that "there will Not be a Reunion this year"!

She did state that she would like to do a cruse reunion on the Great Lakes, but that as of now there are no plans for it, although they are thinking about it for some future date, not yet even in the planing stages.

She did also tell us that the first 2003 Regional will be in Jacksonville, FL in April. That must be BonnieJean's Secret.

Stephanie

If that's what Nancy said, then that is what's going on. It would be next to impossible to have a reunion this year unless the plans were secretly made in advance last year. A major production like a reunion takes a lot of time to plan and coordinate.

My guess would be 2004 at the earliest, or maybe 2005. I also feel we all may be headed to somewhere in the Great Lakes region for the next gathering.

Bob

Great Lakes, Florida, West Coast,New England, anywhere would be great! The more lighthouses the better, as traveling to each one does consume a lot of the available time.As a newcomer to the Lighthousekeepers, I would like to know who makes the decision about location? Is there any feedback or polling as to where it should be held?

I'm up for anywhere, anytime. I guess my first two choices (in no particular order) would be Great Lakes and San Francisco.

Two of the problems with Great Lakes and a cruise are:

Arranging for a vessel - current GL ships appear to be too small at 100 - 125 or so people; they need to get a cruise ship. Cruise ships are a possibility as the GL can certainly handle freighters, etc. but it's logistics, in part.

The other "biggie" is the desire and goal of HL to embark and debark at the same gateway. This, for example, would mean leave Chicago and go up the Wisconsin side of Lake Michigan, cross the lake at some point and come down the Michigan side back to Chicago....or other such arrangements on other lakes. The other part of a larger cruise ship is that they won't (likely) be able to get as close to the lights as the collectors want...the ship will be restricted to shipping lanes and the like.

These logistical concerns are paraphrased from Nancy at the North Georgia Beacon Brigade over the weekend.

For those who wanted Daytona, Amelia Island is not open , but I imagine arrangements could be made with the Coast Guard . St. John's River and Mayport are both on a Naval Base and in today's environment are not accessable . We were there just 2 weeks ago and they wouldn't even let us go in to turn around, they stopped traffic and made us turn around outside the gate . We didn't go to Canaveral to I don't know about it, headed to Orlando from Daytona. I will say though, Ponce de Leon is beautiful . Will be watching to see what happens .

With prior approval, the Coast Guard and the Navy usually will make arrangements for these lights to be viewed. The CG usually wants a group before they will provide a tour and the Navy will usually let you on after you get a visitor's pass through Security. This is the way it was a few months ago, however, with the threat of war things may have changed.

Rich

Short and sweet..if there is reunion, I'll go, regardless of where and when. That is as long as "the good Lord is willing and the creek don't rise". Anyplace you can get together with Wackos is the place for me, regardless of hotels, food or weather! We can adapt. "You can please some of the people some of the time....but you can't please all the people all of the time!
Derith

I think Derith has just expressed the bottom line opinion of 90% of those looking for the next Reunion.

My wife and I have looked into a rather unique vacation cruise on Carnival "Victory" for Sept of 04. It departs from New York and travels north to Halifax and arrives back in N.Y. 4 days later. There are also 5 day and 7 day cruises. Costs appear to start at about $600 per person double occupancy. The Carnival Victory is more than 100,000 tons and is one of the world's largest cruise ships. I don't know how many lighthouses can be seen but I do think it would be a fabulous location for a reunion. Just thinking outside the box - Joe

Great minds think alike!!! We sent Harbour Lights brochures and information on tour ships along the New England coast.. Even though we still want the next Reunion in the Great Lakes area..

My vote is Hawaii, it's probably the only way I will get Larry to take me. If there is anything to do with a lighthouse reunion we're there. And, since I had to forgo Hawaii on our 25th wedding anniversary I say lets do a reunion there
Hey, all kidding aside..I vote either the Great Lakes area, Florida, or the Upper West Coast (Wash./Oregon)
would all be great places.
But, no matter where it will be Larry and I will most likely be there
I do like the reunions where we see lots of the lighthouses from a boat....no people in the pics
CAN'T WAIT NO MATTER WHERE !!!

When ever, where ever...we'll be there. Derith, I couldn't agree with you more.

Dave and Kate

Ok So lets think mini-reunion in sunny San Diego! Yup. Thats what we are planning on doing with the San Diego Regional July 26. The event is on Mission Bay which is perfectly close to the beach, Sea World and the Zoo. So think about how you can spend a couple hours with HL at the bay and then maybe scoot off to join Shamu at Sea World! What do you guys think?!

Right now I'm thinking "why couldn't you have done this last year??????"

WOW Count me and Terry in for this one. Come on you Eastern Friends...come on out west since Terry & I will be coming to Michigan in June. Sounds like great fun.
Ruthie

I'm now slightly confused- am I to understand that there is going to be a Regional in Michigan at the beginning of June followed by a Regional in San Diego the following month?

Or am I reading something wrong here? In the past there has been a 2-3 month span between the Regionals. This year it seems like they are closer together- April in FL, June in MI and July in CA.

Do I have this basically correct? I may have to rethink my plans for June. Or skip Block Island in August.

Dennis

What exactly is a mini-reunion, is that an actual step above a regional or a bunch of hype? Don't take this the wrong way but I want more details before I fly 4,000 miles for it. Will it be more than a days worth of activities? Will there be cruises, a sponsoring hotel, etc......?

I am making a two week trip out West this year, should I plan to make another? Give me a reason why I should go to the expense of San Diego versus driving down the road to Jacksonville.

I vote for Long Island along with a tour of a couple of days to see all the lights out there. Several are in the collection and would be great to see.
Our second choice would be New York and then tour the lights on the river North of the city.
Do I have a Second????

Jakescol.

Count me in for San Diego! Sounds like a great idea.

Ok here is the deal with San Diego. Its still a regional but we are turning it into a destination weekend. We are promoting San Diego by inviting our guests (you) from all over. Special guest appearances will be made, we have a few shows that will promote some new product launches (not new pieces but other Harbour Lights stuff) There will be activities for the kids and the young at heart. I'm trying to find out how I can get some deals for the local attractions. We don't have a sponsoring hotel at this time but I can definitely look into that. Although there is an over abundance of hotels in this town. You can look for more details when the next legacy is sent out in March. Hope this helps.

As we approach 50 messages in this thread, I will close it and send everyone to part 2.
http://www.lighthousekeepers.com/forums/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=44;t=000002;p=1#000000