I, for one, am very stoked that you're coming
Secondly, I think that the rooms are $100-$125/night-ish...but that's me relying on my memory from almost a year ago
😕 Room cost can be reduced by finding roomies. I know that you don't know alot of people yet, but people are always looking for roommates. You can always post a thread in the NEST subforum or the official NEST thread that will be posted later on saying that you're looking for roomies. There are always other people in the same boat. I think we paid around $400 for 3 nights last year including all the taxes and stuff.
Registration last year was around $80. Saturday night you have the option of attending the NEST talent show and dinner. Cost is $45. Plenty of people choose not to go, so if you can't afford it you'll definitely have people to hang out with, but I've gone the past two years and I have found it to be definitely worth the money.
😀
Breakfast is served at the hotel every morning, but you have to be up before 10am (something I have yet to accomplish). Friday night there's a social and food is served. Sunday is the play party and there's food out pretty much all day. So there's quite a bit of food provided, but people still go out to eat alot. I think last year we probably went out at least 4 or 5 times.
As far as travel, there are a metric shit-ton of people in your area who will probably be traveling down for NEST. You've got plenty of time to get to know some of them and maybe arrange for a carpool to reduce travel costs, if you want to. LeeAllure and BrightEyes host a munch scene not far from you - the SNOB munch. Look for threads about it or PM either of them with questions
🙂 EDIT:
Speaking of SNOB events...
So, okay -- based on last year's costs, if you had 4 people to a room for 3 nights, plus registration, plus the talent show/dinner, plus if you went out to eat 5 times and spent $15 each time (a very high estimate, in my opinion), and if you drove down from Boston it would cost you about $100 (about $50 each way). Soooo your total cost would be around...$400 for the entire trip. Keep in mind, that's just my totally random assessment of cost. Anyone else can feel free to chip in and say whether or not they tend to spend more or less.
Lastly, what goes on is fairly simple. We really just kind of take over half a hotel and hang out for 3-5 days. (Official NEST dates are Friday-Sunday, but lots of people are there Thursday to Monday.) We hang out in the lounge area of the hotel or in our rooms and just shoot the shit. Sometimes people get card games together. Every afternoon around 5pm is the hotel happy hour where most drinks are free, and everyone hang out on comfy couches or sits around tables and get to know eachother and catch up. There is inevitably a game or seven of Catch Phrase, and people just meander in and out of rooms seeing who's up to what, who wants to go out to eat or sight-seeing, etc.
There's a schedule that involves Friday night social where everyone hangs out, plays games, eats and gets to know eachother.
Saturday there are a bunch of classes and demonstrations that you can attend if you want to (except the newbie orientation. That's mandatory for newbies....newbie
😛) on stuff like bondage, hypnosis...and other stuff that I can't remember.
Sunday is the big party day. We rent out a big ass room in the hotel and throw a bunch of bondage equipment in there and unleash the deviants. You have the option to play, watch, whatever in there. That goes pretty much all day.
For all of this stuff you can pretty much come and go as you want. It's not like you're forced to participate in anything, but there is plenty for you to do and plenty of opportunities for you to meet people.
There - I hope that makes sense. I kind of lost myself in the middle and just started rambling, but there ya go.
