THE PRESS CHRISTCHURCH WRITERS FESTIVAL

Here I am in the garden city where sadly it is cold and wet, not the weather the Festival organisers would have been hoping for.

I have booked into my hotel, the Heritage, where I was aghast to find that they charge $35 for a 24 hour period to use the Internet in my room. Hey, that's not on!
Last week while in Hawaii I talked of the free high speed Wi-Fi Internet connection supplied by the hotel in all rooms, and the free local telephone calls, (including to mobiles), and free telephone calls to the US mainland thousands of miles away. I'm afraid the Heritage Hotel is way out of step on this issue and I will not be using their services. Rip off is the phrase that springs to mind.

So I took myself off to the Town Hall where most Festival events are being held because I had been assured by organisers that Wi-Fi broadband was available there. Well that proved to be the case but you have to pay Telecom for the use of it.

I am here in Christchurch, at not insignificant personal cost, (airfares, hotel accomodation, meals etc), to cover the Festival on my blog for those who can't be here. And remember I do not earn any income from my blog, and now wherever I turn I am expected to pay for Internet connections!
Damn their eyes I say!

So next port of call is the wonderful Christchurch public library, leaders in the library field in NZ for their Web-savviness, they are also fellow-bloggers, fellow book lovers and fellow Writers Festival goers, and hey presto before you can say Jack Robinson I have free Wi-Fi Internet connection. The library is about a five minute walk from the Town Hall so this is where I will be blogging . They have saved my bacon!

All I have to do now is to figure out how to send and receive e-mail as the library does not provide that service.

But this is my message to the Heritage Hotel, - get wise guys, get into the 21st century, provide free Wi-Fi for your customers instead of using it as another way of extracting cash from them. And Christchurch City, the same to you, make free Wi-Fi available in that beautiful Town Hall if you want to be taken seriously as a Conference and Festival centre. You are living in the past.

There have already been a couple of warm up events prior to my arrival - More than a Pavlova Paradise - featuring foodies David Veart, Kate Fraser and Richard Till, all with books out this year. And The Child that Books Built featuring English writer Francis Spufford in conversation with local children's writer Bill Nagelkerke.

My first outing is tonight -

Cook's Tours - an evening with Vanessa Collingridge author of Captain Cook: Obsession and Discovery who will be in conversation with Peter Elliott, presenter of the TV programme Captain's Log.