I Lost on Jeopardy

The Opening Reception at the conference is always a great time. Seeing many friends that I haven't seen in a year is always a real treat. The requisite food and drink is a bonus.

This year the Opening Reception sees the return of Plant Jeopardy. Teams from each of the host committee institutions will defend the honor of their respective garden. And with Scot Medbury playing the role of Alex Trebek, it should be a quick moving, enjoyable game.

I'm going to go out on a limb and state that the team from Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden will trounce the competition. Bart O'Brien and Lucinda McDade make up team RSABG, and should easily dispatch the teams from Descanso Gardens, LA County Arboretum, and The Huntington Botanical Gardens.

The contest is always a good time. Be sure to stick around for the fun and competition before hitting downtown Pasadena for dinner.

The Curtain Goes Up

The planning is all done. Workshops and tours took off today. Everyone else arrives tomorrow. APGA 2008--The Big Picture is FINALLY here! Hopefully your travels to Pasadena were safe and uneventful. I look forward to catching up with so many of you, and connecting with those of you I have yet to meet.

Welcome to Southern California.

Traffic Troubles

The last time APGA (then AABGA) was held in Southern California, one celebrity really messed things up, causing massive traffic jams and making conference tours late. To relive the nightmare if you were there, or just experience it as you did the first time it happened, check out the video.




We can't guarantee that a celebrity is not going to mess things up again--this is Hollywood after all. But it looks like it's going to be a great conference no matter what happens.

It's Getting Hot Out Here!

If you're reading this post today (6/20) and you glance over to the weather gadget, you'll notice that on Saturday it's supposed to be 105! That's right, 105 degrees F! It doesn't matter how dry a heat that is, it's still HOT. And for Pasadena, which normally has slightly more moderate temperatures than the valleys or further inland, it's really hot. Thankfully, we should be seeing temperatures drop into the mid-80s by Monday...just in time for the kick-off of the conference. As many of the meals, and certainly the host garden tours are going to be outside, make sure to pack your wide-brimmed hat and plenty of sunscreen so you will remain comfortable. See you in a couple days!

Across the Universe

I hope you had a chance to go though the latest issue of Public Garden magazine--the Green Leadership issue. There's a terrific interview with the keynote speaker for the conference, Dr. Charles Elachi, Director of the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

In the interview Dr. Elachi says

We make heroes of sports and entertainment personalities. Yet I have heard that more people go to museums each year than sporting events. We need to showcase the positive things that scientists and botanists do. We need to make the plants the star of the show. I used to take my daughters to Huntington Botanical Gardens to see how amazing it is to watch a flower bloom, and understand why it is pink or any other color. The media should cover the discovery of new plants species like they do the World Series.

I agree wholeheartedly with Dr. Elachi. I can't help but think, with all of the media attention that NASA is getting with the Phoenix Mars lander, how different the NASA budget would be if they hadn't started focusing on PR and marketing to get the American people interested in what they were doing. I wonder how different the world would be, our gardens would be, the global climate change discussion would be, if indeed the description of new plants species were to garner even a small amount of media attention that sporting events, NASA, and misbehaving celebrities get these days.

I'm really looking forward to Dr. Elachi's talk.

Can you beat $175/night?

Was it just three years ago that I attended my first annual conference? It feels longer . . . back then, I was freshly graduated from college and just a month into my job at Jenkins Arboretum—traveling to Chicago on a rather limited budget, as you can imagine. Thanks to the generosity of the Association and Jenkins, nearly all of my costs to attend were covered, excepting incidentals like my deep dish from the original Pizzeria Uno's.

Back then there was, as usual, the conference hotel, but also arranged and advertised by the diligent conference organizers was what they called "alternative lodging," which came to us in the form of dorm rooms at a local university. If you were willing to do without air conditioning and the ability to commute to the meeting via elevator, you could save hundreds on accommodations. At $60/night, my vinyl twin mattress overlooking the elevated train was as good as a featherbed with an ocean view.

Three years later, the degree has changed but I am again a student conferencegoer, this time supported by the APGA and sponsored by the Horticulture department of Cornell University. There are no "official" "alternative" hotels this time around, but if you, like me, could benefit yourself or your organization by saving a few hundred dollars, read on for a few suggestions.


View Larger Map

On the map above, I've placed a red pin at the conference hotel and a blue pin at the Westin, the "overflow" hotel. Nearby are bubbles for other inns listing rates at or below $100 per night. The bubble with the dot, The Pasadena Inn, is my pick: Priceline.com has bookings for $80 per night, placing you just 1 mile from the Westin and just under 2 miles from the Langham. Those are true walking distances, not as the crow flies. Click on the map and bubbles for a bit more information on rates and addresses. You may be able to save a bit more by booking your flight and hotel at the same time.

As Fiacre pointed out in his post below, you'll have some travel issues to work out, but these are not as difficult as they may initially seem. The Langham is fairly isolated from rival hotels, it is true, but now that we are spilling over into the Westin and running a shuttle directly from there to the conference, we have access to a number of lodging options in its immediate area, within about a mile. A local friend of mine informs me that it's easy to get to the area by public transit from LAX:

The Pasadena Inn is in a good place to be reached by public transportation. From the airport, you can take the FlyAway bus to Union Station. It runs every 1/2 hour and costs $4 each way. From Union Station, you can take the Gold Line to Pasadena and get off at Del Mar station, which is at the corner of the Pasadena Inn's block.

See you at the conference, or en route!

Finding a Close-Enough Hotel

Where should I stay? I am usually a fan of staying at a the conference hotel: it makes everything so easy. But I was sluggish of the registration bat, so I need to admit defeat and stay somewhere else. I'm not eager to to pay taxi fees, so the free shuttle between the Westin Pasadena and the Langham makes it seem like a good choice, and I have a week or two before the cut off of June 2nd. However, I'm also interested in paying as little as possible: we're all on budgets, and I feel like doing due diligence means looking a little longer and considering other hotels.



And now I see that the Westin's online reservation site says that the group rate is available until... May 21st? When did that change? It said June 2nd, but I oughtn't to be surprised: may 21st was a month in advance. Hurriedly I check the internet: Google has a list of ten or so hotels. Hotels.com, Travelocity, Expedia all have a range of prices and locations. So there's bound to be someplace! Only once have I truly been out of a place to stay...


Ten years ago I remember arriving in a hotel to discover they had given away my reservation by accident. I next discovered I was visiting a city that was well and truly out of hotel rooms. After my third hour of no success, a clerk took pity on me. He'd arrange for a cot to be pulled out into one of the meeting rooms... Just as soon as the night's party was over. I agreed to this, but shortly after 1:00 a.m., I regretted the deal because the party-ers hadn't seen eachother in 20 years and were still catching up. I snuck quietly through the room as the revelers jawed away, pulled my cot behind a pillar, and sacked out. I woke up to peace, quiet and a new confidence in my ability to improvise while traveling.


Now, I frown at the screen. Where are these places? I'm not afraid of hoofing it sometimes: you just start early, put on your walking shoes and go. And I've been on foot in Pasadena: I remember sidewalk-botanizing on one early morning walk to the regional AABGA conference a few years back. I don't think I'll have much trouble if I plan well. I just need to measure the distance between these available hotels and the Langham. Or the Westin, and catch the shuttle, but I still want to save on price. Now, the work goes to checking each listing one by one. (To be continued...)