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I just got back from Lunacon, the NYC-area's science-fiction convention. This year it was held at the Rye Town Hilton in Rye Brook, New York, a bit north of New York City in Westchester County, and only a few miles south of the Connecticut border. This is the con's second year back from an unfortunate sojourn at two different New Jersey hotels.

The Rye Brook Hilton is infamous for its unusually shaped building which apparently was made by joining two different buildings. The result is that it's possible to walk from the fourth floor on one end of the building to the seventh floor on the other with only a slight gradient, a feature dubbed the "Transdimensional Corridor" by the attending fen.

The con comm has taken advantage of the return to change their function space arrangement somewhat. Two of the changes are good. One is that the dealer's room, formerly jammed into two smallish-rooms off the main corridor, is now in a big ballroom right on the main convention hallway, right next to the art show--a big win. Another is that the gaming room has been moved to the old dealer's room space, which is bigger and easier to find than the old gaming area, another win.

On the other hand, the Con Suite has been moved from a lovely large suite on the other side of the Transdimensional Corridor to a small suite near the gaming area. Not a win--particularly since most of the weekend you could only get seltzer, juice, coffee and tea as beverages there. (It's my understanding that they moved it because the renovations are near the old con suite location, so they may change the location of the Con Suite back next year).

I was unable to reserve a room in the hotel this year. I called a bit late, and the hotel is undergoing some renovations. As a result, they are significantly shorter of rooms than usual. So esrblog and I ended up staying at the Marriott Courtyard Rye, which is about 3 miles away. This turned out to be a good thing. The Courtyard is very close to a good local diner, so esrblog and I didn't have to get up early and were still able to get good breakfasts throughout the con.

I had a lot of fun, but I didn't see much of the convention. That was only partly because we weren't staying in the con hotel. When we were there, esrblog and I spent most of our time gaming. I only saw part of the art show--which was huge, and looked first-rate. As usual, I didn't get to any of the panels, though there seemed to be quite a few of them. In addition, we spent nearly three hours at dinner on Saturday with some of our fannish friends at a Japanese steakhouse near our hotel. The place was called Edo, and if you're ever in the Rye/Port Chester area, I recommend it; it was very good, though terribly crowded. There were only five room parties (one on Friday, four on Saturday), which I did get to, and which were kind of disappointing.

Overall, though, it was a good weekend. I'm going to try to make my reservations a bit earlier next year, so I can sample more of the convention, and see whether Lunacon is getting a new lease on life after its escape from New Jersey.