The Saturday had a free morning, and so I took a leisurly breakfast in the Regency Club on the floor above mine – Floor 8.

Located on the back of the hotel – there are rooms on the front. It has a view over the roof tops of that part of central London.

The lounge is quite large and when I arrived it had all of the tables laid out for breakfast. Even the Boardroom end of the room was setup for people to eat:

The buffet had a wide range of fruit, youghurt, breads, pastries, meet and cheese. The supply was replenished by the staff regularly and the team in the lounge brought you coffee or tea, but you could also help yourself. Eggs – made any way you like – were also available on request. My advise is to order them as soon as you arrive in the lounge as they take 15 minute to be prepared and make it from the ground floor.

The lounge got busy quickly and I left to get on with my other jobs for the day.

The outside of the hotel gives you an idea of the scale of the property.

 

Many of the DO visitors made their way to the visit for the afternoon, but I was unable to attend. The visit was to The Connection at St Martin-in-the-fields a charity selected by the organisers to benefit from the event.

Evening dinner

At 7pm we all gathered again in the lobby for pre-dinner drinks. The meal was sponsored by American Express and was back in the Library.

We had all been allocated places on the 5 tables in the room. I was lucky to sit next to the organiser and my fellow Flyertalk Moderator in the Hyatt Board. I suspect that this was more to do with careful planning by the organisers than luck. I know, because I asked over dinner, that planning to seat people who would get along was a big job, but looking around the room it was clear it had worked. Everyone seemed to be talking to one or more other person, and thoroughly enjoying themselves.

After a great three-course meal, red and white wines and a superb dessert – (think warm chocolate pudding with a hot chocolate sauce centre and vanilla ice-cream) we settled down for a word from our sponsors:

Each sponsor got a great round of applause from the group – their committment was very generous. Lots of prizes for the raffle had been given by Gold Passport – thank you JZ!

Even little old MilesFromBlighty got a mention for the humbugs in the goody bags:

Other sponsors of the items in the bags were also mentioned and thanked.

We then got on to the prize draw – everyone who had booked two nights accommodation was entered in to the draw and with names being printed on room keys and picked by a member of the Hyatt’s staff fair play was seen to be done. The prizes varied from 2 suite upgrades, through elite status until 2015 and up to free nights at the Park Hyatt Maldives!

I was lucky enough to win the 66,000 Gold Passport prize which will give me three free nights at any Hyatt worldwide – can you say Sydney anyone?

So at around midnight emost people went to bed, slept well and awoke with a holiday to plan!

Thanks

Thanks to the organisers – I cannot work out how much work you must have put in before the event and then everyday during it. Trying to get 50+ Flyertalkers somewhere at the same time is task that I cannot imagine without the use of cattleprods and alike. Instead they chose good humour to achieve it and I for one am grateful.

Rumours have it that there will be a repeat in 2013 – pencil the dates 24- 27 October 2013 – and come for a very special experience.