13th Colony and Fan Expo Vancouver

We were there.  It was awesome.

13th Colony was lucky enough to be part of the “Fan Zone” at the inaugural Fan Expo Vancouver back in April. We got a great new poster (from @jediyves) and certainly found more than a few BSG fans in the crowd. Now, the dates are out for next year’s Fan Expo: April 20 & 21, 2013.

Looking ahead, I think we’ve reached a critical point for deciding the future of Canada’s largest Battlestar Galactica fan club.

Do we go on?

With disappointing news about “Blood & Chrome” staying as a web series that SyFy Channel does not appear to know what to do with, and no new BSG content on the horizon, has the time come to take a bow? Attendance at 13th Colony events has been decreasing since the show went off the air and we all expected that. Recently, it’s tough to get anyone to show up at all. We have a reasonably active Facebook group, but our Meetup page is largely inactive. Quite frankly, I’ve been hoping the club would have migrated off the meetup site before now.

Is there enough support out there to have 13th Colony involved in Fan Expo Vancouver 2013? If we’re going to do it, I would like to see the BSG fans put on a display at least on par with the BC Ghostbusters (kudos guys, great booth!) To do it right, we need to build…stuff. Costumes, props, Cylons. I have some great ideas, a few skills and contacts that could make it happen. But, I cannot do it alone. Despite my title, I’m no Laura Roslin or Bill Adama, and I cannot continue to lead us into the future without active support from the club members. We’ve had a great run! It’s been an amazing journey and I’ve met some incredible people because of 13th Colony. It’s because we hit such highs that I would rather see 13th Colony die than just gather dust online.

Are we alive?

Valorie Hoye
aka Madam President

Where Did Laura Dream?

Here at the 13th Colony, we’ve got a mission to find locations where the new BSG TV series was shot.  One of the ones we’ve been looking for (and thought more than once that we had already found) is from “Flesh & Bone” from Season One, where Laura dreams of Leoben.  Well, thanks to the lovely ladies behind www.battlestarlocations.com, we’ve got the inside scoop.  The dream sequence was shot in Robert Burnaby Park in Burnaby.

We’re heading out on Saturday, May 12th at 11am to take a look.  Here’s a link to our meetup event.

There were at least two other scenes shot in the park–from the same episode, Six & Doral waited near a swingset for Sharon to report on the status of her seduction of Helo, and later on Kara was shot on Caprica before being captured and taken to “The Farm.”   “Cabin in the Woods” shot there, as did at least one of the Twilight movies.  Currently, there is a large standing set for the sequel to “Percy Jackson.”

We’ve got a good weather forecast for Saturday’s adventure.  We’ve been known to venture off trails to find a matching camera angle, so wear good footwear!  It’s still early enough that we might find some mucky bits.

For more info, check out this link from Battlestar Locations:

http://www.battlestarlocations.com/1/category/burnaby/1.html

Here’s a google map image of where we will meet–the parking lot next to the baseball diamond:

http://maps.google.ca/maps?q=Edmonds+Street,+Burnaby,+British+Columbia&hl=en&ll=49.230497,-122.935295&spn=0.002449,0.006539&sll=49.244584,-122.976322&sspn=0.009792,0.026157&vpsrc=6&hnear=Edmonds+St,+Burnaby,+British+Columbia&t=h&z=18