Conference venue 2 stage. Left to right: @lordbutterfly and @detlev.
After a long time being on Hive I finally have the opportunity to attend HiveFest this year and see all of you in person for the very first time ever.
Day 0
Took 24 hours from home airport to Split including layovers.
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| Was lucky to complete the final short layover at CDG as everyone was trying to leave Paris on the day after Paralympics. | Landside at SPU airport. IMO the best looking one out of the 4 airports I had to go through despite its lacking amenities. | Met the first few Hivians in Aquarelle in the evening. Image credit @arcange. |
Day 1 (before opening drinks)
Went to Marjan Hill which took 3 hours to complete. Could not believe that the observation deck was just opened 3 days ago when I made it there, what a perfect timing.
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| Begin here. | Viewpoint at Marjan. |
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| New observation deck near Saddle. | Saddle. |
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| Telescope at the top of the deck. Not sure what I was supposed to look at using this. | Spectacular view of northern part of Split at the top of the deck. |
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| Marjan hilltop view. | Live interview by a local TV station. |
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| Proof of presense. | It can get very scary if you have fear of heights. |
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| The other viewpoint featuring a cross... | ...and the Croatian flag. |
Met up with @ninaeatshere, @evelynchacin, @gds89 and Olivia (lmk below if anyone knows her username) for lunch, then @geo52rey, @vaultec and @platinium to discuss presentations later in the day.
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| Had some ćevapi at Kantun Paulina. | Sun was shining directly at me that it is impossible for me to open my eyes when this was shot. |
Day 1 (opening drinks)
Met the singers for HiveFest @fondew and @iamlosi. I checked out their work as soon as the names were announced on X and I liked them all (especially Losi, her songs are an earworm to me). Much better than any famous celebrity that you can think of.
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I can be seen in many other similar posts such as this, this, this and this.
And of course the welcome bag.
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Day 2
The actual conference day in venue 1 held in Galerija Meštrović.
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| Entrance to the venue. | Sea view on the left. |
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| One of his many sculptures on display. | And another one. |
And of course I can't leave the event without a photo with @crimsonclad.
Day 3
Continuation of day 2 held in Dioklecijanova palača. 7.30AM to 9AM (aka before the conference starts) was the best time to explore the place without too many tourists getting in the way.
There are 5 ticketed places that you can visit for €15 total.
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| Center of the palace. Presentations were held in the basement floor. | Bell tower. |
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| Venue entrance | Venue hall |
On the same day I presented @aioha to the audience.
Day 4
Visited Pepeland (very relevant in crypto) before taking a 30 minute walk to Billard Club.
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Day 5
Finished off HiveFest with viewing of rally car on racetrack and closing drinks at Antique Bar (which is rated 3.4 stars on Google due to poor service, seems right to me as dinner was served very late).
Day 6
While everyone else was on the charted boat tour I had to leave Split and end it here.
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Total cost
Everything came out to be roughly €1,899.04 for me to attend HiveFest 9. Slightly lower than expected.
Final thoughts
It was well worth the cost to be able to meet every single one of you in person and to present @aioha live on-stage.
It felt safe to walk alone in Split (I have seen kids on their own at night) and most places are reachable by foot within 10-20 minutes walk. Food was as good as where I live.
However, one thing that would make me not recommend this place to anyone is that people are smoking everywhere, sometimes including indoors especially the Billard Club and the bars in opening and closing drinks (unless you're the offender yourself). It makes me sick even till now as I'm posting this.