Theme: The mystery of the blue danube
Location: Arcotel Wimberger
This has been a really special convention! After all those years, Vienna is finally getting its own furcon. The entire community came together and people even put some long-held differences aside and organized one heck of a convention. What made this even more special is that the venue was just down the street. I did not get a room, since I did not want other people to not be able to get a room while I could easily just sleep at home. This turned out to be a good idea as the hotel was so full, an overflow location was booked as well! Shorty stayed at our place during the con since he decided on short notice to also attend.
I went to the hotel at 10:30 to see if there was any help needed with setup. Shorty already was there since 8, but that was much too early for me. I filled out about 20 pages of forms to be formally staff, said hi to LilNoodles and Vex, and helped a bit with unpacking. I ended up helping at the fursuit lounge as I have no clue about stage tech. There wasn't much to do though as an important shipment was missing, so work was standing still. I went to get some food at Billa and biked back home for now.
Henrieke and I had some lunch and I received a package with my Karpour standee for the Dealers Den, after the third try with the unreliable printing company.
I finished a conbadge I promised Goddy, then we went to the office to pack up our Dealers Den stuff. This is the first con I ever had a Dealers Den table at!
I went back to the hotel, by now the shipment had arrived and we could start assembling the pipe monster for the fursuit lounge. It was a lot of pipe-plugging and screwing. Thanks to a lot of volunteers, everything went smooth and most of the fursuit lounge was set up fairly quickly.
I chatted a bit with Apollo and met Birko in the lobby. I sat there a bit and finished Goddy's badge, then I met Gallen (who came all the way from Singapore!) who has been shopping in Vienna. We know each other from Mastodon, and it was really nice to meet in person. I went home again, cleaned up a bit, laminated the badge for Goddy, then I packed up the fursuit stuff and started my journey to the hotel.
There weren't many people in the lobby, so I chilled a bit on an inflatable couch.
Eventually I met up with Nico, Tabbie and Toanir and we decided to go to my place and have some beers. We picked them up at a small Asian import store with a really weird owner who kept ranting about Pokémon cards for some reason and then went to my place.
We hung out for a while, they left around midnight. Henrieke and I stayed at home of course, since we did not have a hotel room.
We got up at 10, went to the office and got our 30kg suitcase of Dealers Den stuff. On the way to the hotel, we stopped at Kent, the best Kebap place in Vienna and grabbed 2 Döner Kebaps. We watched cute wasps and pigeons in the park while eating, then we continued our 10-minute walk to the hotel since that was faster than waiting for the tram. We met Tabbie, Nico and Toanir at the hotel. Henrieke sat with them in the courtyard and I stood in line to get my badge. There was only one small desk, but thanks to Diego's hard work, registration was incredibly efficient. Tabbie and the others went to Wok Imbiss, I sat in the lobby with Henrieke and drew a dragon to get back into drawing a bit. Karakina came by and said hi, Tabbie as well.
I gave Goddy his badge. The opening ceremony was postponed to 16:00, but we eventually saw it. It featured an elaborate graphic novel style game video, which was the beginning of a mystery game spanning the entire convention. Lots of cool drawings and voice acting!
After the opening ceremony we went to Tabbie's room and I suited a bit as Baseball. Baseball met Purple and Goddy and roamed around in the lobby a bit. After suiting, we went to a nice Austrian restaurant with Tabbie, Nico, Toanir, Godracos and DeepBlue.
I had a schnitzel the size of Liechtenstein, it was really good but there was no way I could ever finish it. We went back to the hotel and set up our Dealers Den table until 22:00, then we brought the empty suitcase to Tabbie's room.
We rested a bit in the lobby, Spikie was still not here as she was working to finish Nico's fursuit.
Since it was late, we went home. Tomorrow was going to be a long and exhausting day of dealing!
We went to the hotel around 10 and were greeted by Nico in his new fursuit that Spikie finished the day before.
We also met Wolfmote, Spikie and Marshmallow. We dropped off some things at the Dealers Den, then went to Billa around the corner to fetch some quick lunch. Once the Dealers Den opened, we got the first influx of sponsors, which got exclusive access from 12:00 to 13:00. I sold 2 shirts, a bunch of stickers and got enough commissions to keep me busy all day. Sertro, Varimo and Atura dropped by. I also met Satti, who likes cartoony art just as much as I do!
At 16:30 I took a break from dealing and took Baseball to the inflatables panel. I didn't bring my Sea Dragon, but there was a nice Lapras there! Spikie was nice enough to take some photos.
I went back to the Dealers Den. Yamavu bought a federal eagle shirt. At 18:30 we packed up and brought the money box to Tabbie's room. Then we went to see the tail end of the snack exchange.
Gallen brought some white rabbit candy, something Henrieke is very nostalgic about. We chatted a bit with Gallen and Shorty, then we went to the activity room around the corner where Tabbie and Nico were having fun in the ballpit. Other than a ballpit, the room also had an air hockey table and some arcade machines. I went to the room to get Baseball, who met up with the others. Henrieke went to Tabbie's room to get some rest.
Baseball, Marshmallow, Spikie, Tabbie, Toanir, Nico and Wolfmote went to the Vienna public library to take some photos on the rooftop. Luckily there was an elevator! We spent some time up there and got some strange looks and some kids that found us very entertaining.
After going back, I got out of suit, Tabbie and the others continued. Henrieke and I met Goddy in the lobby and we decided to have some dinner at Mari's Metcha Market, a really nice Japanese restaurant close to the hotel. Neop, Mellos and HairyOrc joined us as well.
We were lucky enough to get a big table and had some amazing teriyaki salmon and gyoza. Henrieke did an art trade with Neop and we had a really nice evening there. Back at the hotel, I chatted with Cheetah a bit, who was impressed by the convention (just like I was so far!). I checked out the dance, then went to the room to get Baseball. Henrieke went home in the meanwhile. Baseball met Thandi and Entropie outside. It was very stinky from all the smokers and the cars outside the hotel though, and Baseball did not want to smell like cigarettes, so he went inside again. On the dancefloor, Baseball met Goddy, then at 22:30 he went back to Tabbie's room. I went home soon after that.
We went to the hotel early today since it was going to be brutally hot today. We had breakfast at the hotel, which was really nice.
We met Spikie, Toanir, Marshmallow and others. Tabbie and Nico overslept but eventually joined too. We dumped our stuff in Tabbie's room, then I went downstairs to the lobby and met Artec, who I met online because he found me Telegram stickers with my character holding a Handheld PC. He was also very much into Handheld PCs, and I brought my trusty HP 320lx. We ended up sending each other files over infrared, and me trying some software he developed on my HP.
We spent some time nerding out about Windows CE 1.0. Maily stopped by and took some photos and told us his parents liked our Dealers Den table yesterday. I went to Billa to pick up some Leberkäsesemmeln (the essential Austrian snack) and a Red Bull, then I went to the Dealers Den to set up our table with Henrieke.
At 13:50 I left for what I thought would be 20 minutes to get Baseball and Kiki to the group photo. It turned out to be delayed quite a while, but it all worked out! I talked with Raklor and Ryux a bit there. CartoonCoon took the group photo.
An hour later I was back in the Dealers Den, drawing commissions. Tabbie was nice enough to fetch us some sushi from Wok Imbiss.
After an exhausting but very successful day of dealing, we packed up and with help from Shorty, were done at 19:30.
We spent a while sitting in a corner on the second floor with Shorty. Bagel dropped by to pick up his commission. Shorty ended up showing us the rooftop terrace of the hotel.
Henrieke didn't feel too well, so she went to rest in Tabbie's room. I went downstairs a bit and chatted with Bronko and CuteFluff. Satti was also there, and I made a quick sketch for him on my reMarkable. Goddy also joined, and as usual he knew everyone!
I went up again to check on Henrieke, who has some trouble with the 35 degrees today. Then I got Baseball and went to the dance. Baseball met Tabbie and Nico downstairs. They all had a blast at the dance!
Kana djed and it was pretty lit! Baseball also met AshCoyote and ChipFox and got a photo taken with them. Baseball took a break and just missed Henrieke, who took Kiki down to the lobby. Baseball went to down to meet them and got some photos taken, then he went to the room again.
I took a quick shower and went downstairs again.
We sat at the bar with Shorty and had a drink. I chatted with Maily for a while about how well the con was going and what an achievement of the Austrian community this was. They closed the bar at 0:30 and kicked us out.
We went upstairs and packed or stuff, Shorty packed up his kangaroo suit. We chatted a bit with Toanir, Wolfmote and others, then we left the hotel. Since there were no more trams going, we had to walk home, which took about 15 minutes. We arrived home at 1:20.
We slept in a bit today and went to the hotel at 12:00. We met Nico and Tabbie in the lobby. Nico got a "Barking Ticket" for 10000$! I went to the room and got wingy Baseball out, who flapped around in the lobby for a while. He ran into AshCoyote and ChipFox again and gave winghugs to lots of people. There was also a cute kid in the lobby that enjoyed Baseball's huge wings a lot!
After around 45 minutes I got out of suit, I can't wear this suit very long as it's really exhausting to never rest your arms. The EzCooldown vest I brought worked great though. My arms were hot, my torso was a block of ice.
I met Artec again in the lobby. Today I brought my Jornada 720 and let him try it. I also showed him how booting Linux on it worked. Yamavu and Atura came by too.
We had lunch with Goddy in the courtyard, and annoyingly enough the person in front of us got the last burger, so we had to have a kinda mid toast. Naunan, Batty, Yamavu and Atura also came by.
Henrieke and I queued for the closing ceremony with Goddy, and with a lot of luck, we even got some seats on the balcony. The ceremony was fun, it was about 30 minutes too long though. The charity total was a respectable (roughly) 5000€ and the mystery was concluded. The theme for next year was announced, and everyone applauded around 50 times during the ceremony, mostly for a chair.
After the ceremony we sat outside with Purple. Purple left, and Goddy joined.
We checked on Tabbie and Nico, but they were in a food coma. Then we went to Westbahnhof to grab some food with Yamavu, Atura, Shorty and Goddy.
It was almost unbearably hot in the train station, so we ate our McDonald's value meals quickly, grabbed a McSundae and walked back to the hotel. We sat in the lobby and chatted with Shorty. Nico was enjoying suiting way too much.
I went home and brought some of our stuff there, I also picked up a toothbrush and some essentials for Henrieke, as she stayed in the hotel tonight. Tabbie and Nico already departed tonight, so the room was free. Back at the hotel, I got Baseball and went to the dance. Goddy already waited and gave me the sad news that I missed all the corny music, like "Anton aus Tirol". Baseball roamed around in the lobby and waved to cars passing by. Goddy said bye to everyone and left. The dance had some nice progressive electro house, and Baseball met Kazzador there. After bouncing a bit, Baseball sat with Henrieke, who was chatting with Tom, the guy selling all the EzCooldown stuff. I got out of suit and went down again. Tom just left, and we chatted a bit with SilverFoxWolf about Austrian customs and his trip through Europe.
SilverFoxWolf went to bed, and we went up to Tabbie's room. Tabbie and Nico had already left the con by then. I packed up all our things, and went home with Shorty. We ended up still chatting until 2:00.
Shorty went to the hotel super early again, I arrived at 10:00 and said hi to Birko and bye to Toanir, who was just leaving. There were lots of volunteers again so the entire fursuit lounge was packed up by 12:00.
I left and went home and made some fish sticks with Henrieke. Shorty arrived later. Henrieke and I went to "Haus des Meeres", one of the most unique Zoos in the world, to meet up with Neop. I told him about the tropical house with lots of Egyptian flying foxes. We spent 3 hours there and enjoyed a nice view over Vienna and checked out all the newly built areas.
We saw ring-tailed lemurs, black lemurs and a vontsira. Sadly no rat kangaroos. We hoped to see lots of bats, but only one of them was out. The bat had a little baby bay clinging to her though, which was adorable!
After the Zoo closed, we went to grab some food at Brandauer's, which had a beautiful view of the sunset.
This place used to be the location of the monthly furry stammtisch, very fitting. After food we went to get some ice cream and walked back to Westbahn Hotel with Neop. Neop couldn't refuse my offer to art jam, so he joined us home and we spent the rest of the evening watching Megabattie videos on YouTube and doing an art trade!
Neop left around midnight.
Wow, what a con! An incredible achievement by the community, and extremely impressive for a first year con. The attendee number was over 700, pretty much nothing went wrong, the vibe was great and I see a bright future for this con! Special thanks to Kruemel, LilNoodles, Vex, Diego and all other staff for putting in countless hours of work to make this possible. I look forward to next year, where I will likely opt for getting a hotel room!
