Mini Gathering???

[Jezebel]

Anything in San Francisco would be a very small and likely private matter better discussed with Greg and Liz.

[Kree]

San Jose, that way we can eat food at Alexander's, the greatest restaurant in all the world. I'm also always up for Vegas, but I have learned that you shouldn't gamble with friends, instead meet up with them for food and booze, which sorta eliminates the charm of a gathering. Crescent city might be nice. You have the redwoods and the beach. DisneyLand is also a tops choice, especially with the new restaurants at california adventure. And the Blue Bayou restaurant there, is one of my favorites.

[Deacon]

San Luis Obispo!

[bagheadinc]

Maryland.

[Mae Dean]

Sri Lanka!

[tnitnetny]

I second Maryland.

I mean, we have Baltimore, Washington, DC, Annapolis (naval academy). What more would you want?

[bagheadinc]

Baltimore

We can all go to the aquarium and see a dolphin show!

[kaiju01]

I'd want a LOT more than Baltimore.

[Lizzegirle]

I am against the San Francisco thing due to the fact that it is hard enough to get around this city with a car full of people. Adding more people just makes it that much more difficult. If you would like to take a trip to SF on your own, we will gladly take you out on the town and show you all the awesome stuff, but SF it much better suited for small, intimate groups.

I like Vegas as there is something for everyone there. We don't necessarily need to be attached at the hip the entire time, and it is always fun to take over a poker table with some good friends. Perhaps Reno might be a good choice too? Cheaper, and less hectic than Vegas. It's not nearly as flashy, but I like the casinos better.

I have no interest in Catalina. Maybe I'm retarded for that, but Catalina is "meh" for me.

San Diego could be fun, but I'm afraid it would end up like Magic Mountain again where we end up standing in lines and not seeing as much because we all travel at different paces.

We could do Tahoe if we go before the end of October. It's a little silly for me to take a vacation to the town I grew up in, but I could show you guys all of the awesome sights and there would be gambling there too. It's tough to get to though. We could rent a van at Reno and I could drive it to Tahoe. It's only about an hour and a half drive. But we would all have to get into Reno at about the same time. Carson City could be a nice little stop for everyone along the way. Not really an attraction for me, but I think you guys might have a good time. Rental houses might be fairly inexpensive during that time too.

[Deacon]

I think it's likely I'd be down for Reno/Tahoe, San Diego, even Vegas. Honestly the Reno/Tahoe thing sounds awesome mostly due to the fact that it's rare to end up there (for me, as I've never been), and it's supposed to be beautiful up there, and we'd have a lovely local guide to direct us to the best stuff

[Infin8Cyn]

I think I would probably enjoy a short trip of this nature, with enough advance notice. I personally would prefer a trip to San Francisco, as I've never gotten the chance to actually hang out there for a couple of days and take it in, much less with someone who actually lives there. I don't know if this would necessarily rule out Jez's own, separate trip at some point in the future...

It's fun. I could easily burn half a day in Chinatown alone. I wish I had more time to kill last time I was through there. It's also expensive and parking is a bitch. As Liz mentioned, I'm not sure how we'd go about getting around. That's nightmare inducing by itself.

I'm also in agreeance with Liz regarding theme parks. RLF's already had one bad experience there. I've personally never been to Vegas, and by the fact you can carry a beer on the strip it sounds like a great place to try. I've never been to Tahoe or Reno though... so, I'm equally moot. The time now, however, depends entirely on the dates/times. I've got full time work and school, not to mention making business trips to Houston.

[Jezebel]

A few notes:

San Jose is not on the table, neither is anything out of the state (other than something in Nevada). If we stayed at a coastal town it would be something within 2 hours or so of the LA area.
If we went to San Diego, we'd likely be looking at the Wild Animal Park or the Zoo, neither of which are theme parks, so we wouldn't be running into what we did with MM. The only theme park we were looking at was Universal Studios.
Disneyland also wasn't really one of the options.
Reno or Tahoe could be nice, and it's something that we hadn't thought of before. I'll take a look at prices flying into/out of there and see what everything looks like. Something nice about Vegas, is you can get $20 or so roundtrip "megabus" tickets to/from LA, which is a lot cheaper than flying for us! Vegas is generally pretty cheap to fly into, so that's something to keep in mind too.

I did a quick look up on plane ticket prices, this is just for tickets, not for hotels or anything like that. Just to give an idea of what we'd be looking at.

Reno
Dallas - $237
SA - $400
LAX - $205
SFO - $213

Vegas
Dallas - $343
SA - $293
LAX - $118
SFO - $166

As far as plane tickets go, Vegas is mostly the cheaper option by a fair amount, it would probably come down to hotel prices and such. Another thing to keep in mind are rental costs.

One thing to keep in mind is this is meant to be a relatively inexpensive weekend getaway thing, not a full on vacation.

[FirebirdNC]

I would be totally into a Reno/Tahoe trip and with kids in school a weekend would suit even better (and no they wouldn't be coming )

[Deacon]

Prices vary somewhat based on carrier and the dates on which we'd be flying, but generally Vegas is going to get the better airline deals out there. Sometimes they even have the $99 one way type fares when there's a special going on. Did you have an idea as to what kind of time frame would be likely? And to what extent is cost the arbitrator of destinations, as I know it can be pretty improtant?

Otherwise, y'all could just come crash at my house for a long weekend or something

[ampersand]

Stayed over night at a Holiday Inn Express in Tahoe in February. $79. It was there the manager complained to me how Lake Tahoe had gotten less and less snowfall each year, and that winter, they only got maybe 5 inches total so far. And it was also unusually warm for that time of the year, he claims.

I really loved traveling up on California Highway 1 and even stayed a night at a beach side hotel ($149 that night, but well worth it.). If you're going to do the Gathering on the Atlantic Ocean, you might as well do the mini gathering somewhere along the Pacific Ocean, but not in San Francisco.