APAC OTN Tour 2015 - Wellington, New Zealand

Apart from having to fly back to Sydney overnight, to catch a flight to Wellington, this was quite an uneventful trip.

Again Richard had planned our travel so we arrived early afternoon, and the first thing we did was take a walk.

Now we know why Wellington is called 'Windy', even their name badge incorporates this and a recent article in the guardian suggests it is the windiest city in the world. The phenomena that really impressed Richard and I was how the wind blows across the surface of the sea, bringing waves of blown water, which are mesmerising. We sat in a coffee shop watching it for ages and then braved the wind as we walked around the beautiful harbour. Definitely somewhere I want to return to.

That evening the NZOUG committee took us to dinner in the hotel which is also where the event was being held the next day. I want to say a big thank you here, when you have been travelling for so long  you really appreciate whatever sleep you can get, but you have to eat, so being treated to an early dinner, close by is ideal. Mix that with the most amazing food ever, and I',m not a foodie but this was outstanding, and with a view over the harbour, I was in heaven.

The conference was really well attended with more people turning up on the day. I again opened with my digital disruption session and we had a great discussion about what people felt locally. This is good learning for me, as I have just had a session accepted for Collaborate that looks at cloud adoption around the world, asking if it is all the same?

Later I gave my PaaS4SaaS session which was followed by Shay Smeltzer one of the product managers, unfortunately I couldn't sit through his session as I had a conference call with the UK.

After a wonderful lunch in the same restaurant that was an amazing indian buffet, Richard and I took a short walk in the now sunshine and then left for early flights out. Wellington airport was amazing with its Gollum artwork, I am not a Lord of the Rings fan but it is very impressive.

The NZOUG were wonderful hosts and I hope I will be invited back soon. It was a great end to a very short and packed tour but I am so glad I went. The world we work in is changing and being part of the discussion and understanding is very important. Usergroups enable that discussion and OTN enables people like me to share our knowledge.

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