ABUG South
I am pleased to announce that booking is now open for the next in person ABUG South.
Important! Some of the arrangements differ from previous years. Please read this post in full.
Venue
The event will take place from Friday 18th to Sunday 20th March 2022 at The Ely, London Road, Blackwater, CAMBERLEY, Hampshire, GU17 9LJ.
It is a combined hotel and pub/restaurant. We have been there a number of times now and to another hotel in the same chain in Leicestershire. The feedback for this venue has been very positive. The meeting room is just off the bar. They have a great selection of food which they will happily bring to us in the meeting room. They have a spiffing carvery for Sunday lunch which is very popular with fans of over-indulgence.
The meeting room is much bigger than anywhere else we have been in recent years. The official capacity is 110 (although I think that is perhaps a bit sporting). At the previous ABUG South events, we have been comfortably able to accommodate everyone who attended with a full table each and plenty of room to pass between tables. This is, however, somewhat contingent on people being kind enough to bring a few extra tables, as the hotel has a limited number of rectangular tables and round tables do not work very well for our setup.
- IMG_0217.jpg (52.93 KiB) Viewed 5980 times
The room also contains a large projector screen. So, if anyone has a Beeb compatible projector and cable they can bring along, I am sure there will be much fun to have with that.
Travel
The venue is a short distance from J4a of the M3 and pretty close to the M4 too. There is a reasonable amount of parking on site. There are nearby stations at Blackwater and Fleet which are less than 10 minutes by car (and, as usual, I am sure that there will be volunteers to do pick-ups). They are just branch line stations but are easily accessible from Reading, London Paddington and London Waterloo. It is about a half hour drive from Heathrow Airport.
How to book a place
Places will be subject to a charge of £15 per head (although I am not planning on taking any money until much closer to the time). The £15 charge covers the cost of the meeting room together with as much tea, coffee, fizzy pop and unhealthy snacks as you can consume.
If you wish to reserve a place, please post in the thread below or send me a PM, either through the forum or via Facebook. (I can be found in the Acorn Computer and BBC Micro Enthusiasts section as 'Justin Nathan')
If you do not take one of the above steps, you will not have a place. In particular, it is not sufficient to click 'going' in the Facebook event page.
T-shirt size
When booking a place, please let me know your t-shirt size. You can do this in the booking thread below or, if you prefer not to publicise your size, you can send me a PM. Your size will not be displayed in the list of attendees, merely the fact that you have notified me of your size.
How to book a hotel room
If you wish to stay at the hotel, you can book direct through the hotel website or by phone on 0345 608 6040.
Make sure that you quote the discount code WIN21SALE. With the code, the cost of a room on a single occupancy basis with breakfast is £70. (To be clear, that is £70 in total for the whole weekend - i.e. £35 per night). On a double occupancy basis the total price rises to £100. Some people have experienced difficulties with the code and found that WINSALE21 works instead. At present, both codes seem to work for me.
In the run up to the last event, as the hotel reached capacity, the discount code stopped working. You are therefore strongly advised to book as early as possible. At present, we have not yet been able to negotiate a more permanent arrangement with the hotel.
What happens at ABUG
Acorn & BBC Micro User Group (ABUG) events are open to enthusiasts of the BBC Micro, Acorn Electron, Atom and Archimedes/RISC OS machines. Attendees will typically stay for two if not all three days. The events are always very informal and can involve:
- members bringing their own hardware to set up and show off*
- time spent working on hardware and programming/games projects
- exchange of ideas/knowledge
- upgrade and repair of poorly Acorn machines
- collaborative work on community projects, such as software preservation, preparation/planning for displays at other events etc.
- sale of items by members (not guaranteed, but there are often opportunities to buy bits)
- general socialising, food/drink and the odd hi-score competition!
- Important! Ensure that any hardware you bring that features the RIFA/paper-type capacitors with a tendency to go POP (e.g. Beebs) have had the caps changed! We can't risk setting any smoke alarms off as that may incur charges!
There are very few rules:
- no hot food is to be consumed at the venue other than that which is purchased from the bar/restaurant
- no alcoholic drinks are to be consumed at the venue other than that which is purchased from the bar/restaurant
- see below regarding children
- the hotel is a snake-free venue; please do not bring any snakes to the event
After considering the views expressed in an earlier thread, it seems the following points are the best/fairest way of dealing with COVID-19:
- all attendees must comply with the law
- all attendees must comply with any rules laid down by the venue
- the number of attendees will be limited to 25 (rather than the previous 35)
- space for spouses/partners cannot be guaranteed ᠆ if you wish to bring someone with you, please let me know and we can consider if there is capacity to accommodate them
- as a matter of courtesy to your fellow attendees, you are encouraged to take a lateral flow test before setting out for the venue and each morning ᠆ this, however, is a matter of choice and will not be enforced.
- if you have symptoms, a positive test result or are required to self-isolate please do not attend ᠆ if you develop symptoms or a positive test result at the venue, please let me know and then leave immediately
- subject to tolerable temperatures, the external doors will be left open to improve ventilation
- mask wearing will be a personal choice
- if you are visiting another attendee's table, please respect any request they may make to wear a mask or restrict the number of people around the table
ABUG meetings are not child friendly events because of the following:
- there is not often a lot to engage the interest of very young children
- people working with hot soldering stations
- people working with potential toxic substances (lead, IPA)
- people working with exposed mains voltages
- large amounts of electrical cabling representing potential trip hazards
- lots of fragile, expensive and sometimes rare equipment
If, however, children become a risk to themselves or others, they will have to leave.
New members
We are particularly keen for new members of the forum to attend these events. You do not need to be working on developing a Cray 1 second processor for the Beeb or porting Crysis to the Acorn Atom. You just need to be interested in Acorn computers. People often come just to enjoy a beer and a chat. Indeed, you don't necessarily have to be specifically interested in Acorn computers. We have certainly seen Dragons, Apples, Sinclairs and Commodores (and other more obscure machines) making an appearance.
We are a friendly bunch and we will make sure you feel welcome. If you have any questions or uncertainty about the event, please feel free to PM me (either on this forum or using Facebook Messenger - I can be found in the Acorn Computer and BBC Micro Enthusiasts section as 'Justin Nathan').
Confirmed
Reserve list
- JudgeBeeb (Robert) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- cmorley (Chris) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- Arcadian (Dave) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- BigEd (Ed) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- tricky (Richard) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- dudleysoft71 (James) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- 1024MAK (Mark) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- kieranhj (Kieran) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- tom_seddon (Tom) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- sbadger (Stewart) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- Dave Footitt (Dave) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- flibble (Peter) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- mattyj (Matt) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- MattH (Matt) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- helpful (Bryan) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- elk1984 (Trevor) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- IanS (Ian) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- baz4096 (Chris) - paid
- KrisLadair (Kris) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- SarahWalker (Sarah) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- Prime (Phill) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- scropp (Stephen) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- Revaldinho (Rich) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- inky (Mark) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- daveejhitchins (Dave) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening - paid
- Joka80 (Costa) - Saturday only
- steve3000 (Steve) - Saturday only
- soruk (Michael) - Saturday only
- sPhilMainwaring (Phil) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening
- DamoJay (Damian) - arriving Friday afternoon, leaving Sunday evening
- markoceans (Mark) - Saturday only
I have a mug from a previous abug event that I've never used. Do we really need T-shirts?
