I’m looking travel arrangements for this year’s DAMOP meeting in Charlottesville, VA in May, and, boy, do the options suck.
Flying into Charlottesville itself involves at least one stop, and undoubtedly one of those ridiculous little prop planes that require me to spend the whole flight in something close to a fetal position. Driving would take better than eight hours, according to Google, which isn’t something I’m fired up to do (it’s better than a prop plane, though, and wouldn’t take all that much longer once you figure in time sitting in airports).
Probably the best option is to fly into Dulles and rent a car, but that’s sort of silly, given that the meeting is generally an all-day affair, so I’d be paying to rent and park a car for four days. It’s probably cheaper than any of the airport shuttle type options would be, though.
I’m not enthusiastic about any of this. Anybody have any better suggestions? It’s the one meeting a year that I make a point to go to, and generally a really good conference, so “skip it and get summaries from other people” is not a useful option.