Star Trek

Four thousand Trekkers and 11 guest stars overtook the Norbreck Castle Hotel, Blackpool, England for the weekend July 27th-29th 2001, to celebrate the conclusion of Star Trek: Voyager.
The weekend involved talks by the guests- which included 5 regular cast members, Kate Mulgrew, Robert Picardo, Ethan Phillips, Robert Duncan McNeill and Tim Russ- an auction of memorabilia provided by the stars themselves, photo opportunities and autographs, as well as 3 late night parties.
All the guests, including other Voyager stars- Alice Krige, Keegan DeLancie, Richard Herd (Admiral Paris), Finton McKeown (Michael "Fair Haven"), Vaughn Armstrong (Korath, "Endgame") and Rob LaBelle (Oxilon "Homestead"), delighteds crowds with their unending patience, signing autographs and posing for photos.
Kate Mulgrew made a special impression- keeping her promise of making sure every attendee had the opportunity of her autograph. The biggest applause was for surprise guest, Patrick Stewart, who dropped in on Sunday afternoon to entertain with Kate Mulgrew- his first convention for almost 3 years.
It was a last minute decision to go to the Voyager Convention. I had had my eye on going for months, but it wasn’t until a week beforehand did we finally make the decision and book tickets for the Sunday only.

Having no experience of conventions, we only arrived at the Norbreck Hotel at 8.30am and that was only because someone else in our guesthouse was going at that time. It was truly bizarre travelling down Blackpool promenade and seeing dozens of Starfleet personnel and a smattering of Klingons and Boleans walking along! The queue was already snaking its way around the car park, I had never seen so many Star Trek fans in one place! We managed to creep our way up the queue by collecting our wrist bands and sneaking along inside. We managed to get seats about 10 rows from the front

The convention was held in celebration of the end of the seven year run of Star Trek Voyager and the organisers had pulled out all the stops to get as many of the “crew” as possible (why do I suddenly feel like I’m on Galaxy Quest?!).

It was the hottest weekend for so many hundreds of years and the hall soon heated up with 3000 people sitting in regimental rows waiting for the actors to arrive. The day passed over too quickly with actors on and off the stage, telling stories and jokes. Tim Russ took to the stage for a sing-song and Kate Mulgrew told a detailed story of how she met her husband, politician Tim Hagan. There were many laughs shared amongst guests and attendees for what was a memorable day.