Come Fly With Me

I don't think any other metropolitan area has more choices when it comes to air travel than the greater Los Angeles area. One of the most important decisions you could make regarding APGA 2008, besides deciding to attend in the first place, would be which airport you choose to fly into.

The 800-pound gorilla is certainly LAX. The airport is the largest and the busiest in the region. Name an airline, and it goes through LAX. But with size comes some challenges. Car rental is WAY off site. You absolutely must arrive 2 hours before your flight because of the size of the airport, the number of people, and the security issues. And going to the airport, as well as coming from, there are the issues of LA traffic.

The closest airport to the conference hotel is the Bob Hope Airport, aka Glendale Burbank Pasadena Airport. You deplane directly onto the tarmac and the baggage pickup is outside. And yet a number of airlines fly in with their jet service. You'll probably pay a bit more for your ticket, but you can't beat the convenience.

Depending on your preferred airline, and how much you want to avoid LAX, you might also look at LA/Ontario Airport and Long Beach Airport. Both are smaller airports with plenty of convenience to recommend them both.

Unless you are planning on spending time in Orange County at the beginning or end of your trip, it would be hard to recommend John Wayne Airport. It's really too far away and not that convenient to the Annual Meeting location.

Regardless of how you fly in, and how challenging you flight might have been, I can guarantee that once you get to the Langham, all your travel frustrations will be quickly forgotten.

Kick-Off

Good afternoon and Happy Seis de Mayo!

Welcome to The Big Picture Blog. For those of you who aren't familiar with The Big Picture, or the APGA Annual Meeting, this Blog will hopefully get you up to speed, and give you behind the scenes access to the planning and the conference itself.

For those of you who are familiar with attending Annual Meetings, we'll give you insider tips for getting the most out of the meeting.

In the coming days, weeks, and months, we hope to look under the hood, so to speak; to get at the essence of the conference.

We'll report on the stories behind the sessions. We'll take you behind the scenes and show you the side of the conference that doesn't always make it into the newsletters, emails, or website of APGA.

Whether or not you're joining us for the meeting in June, we hope you'll tune in regularly to learn about what's going on as we prepare for our close-up.