ha... baldur's gate had the exact same issue with travel. early on it was insta-death. later when you leveled it was do-able. Frustrating though, having to load a bunch of time when traveling. I agree it should be at least attemptable, if not easy at early levels

Get Mass Effect for a tenner this weekend. (Off of Steam)
Then when you have finished that wait a little then move in on DA:O

I went ahead and bought this game tonight, since I got a bit of a deal on it. I made it to Lotharin (playing a female dwarf commoner warrior), and I'm actually quite enjoying it so far.
Combat is more fun and more tactical than I expected, certainly moreso than the infinity engine games, though I haven't quite gotten the hang of maneuvering everyone about the way I need. I think I still would have preferred turn-based, but it works well in its own way.
The writing is perhaps a little ornate, but to be honest I find that refreshing in a way. Alistair and Morrigan already crack me up. I like the story thus far, though it hasn't wowed me yet.
Performance and visuals are both great - on a decent level of detail it seems to run about as well as Mass Effect, which surprised me - and it alt-tabs very nicely (seriously, why do PC developers keep screwing that up?). My dwarf has oddly skinny legs and tiny feet, though, and I had to turn off persistent gore, because it's hard not to giggle when everyone is standing around idly chatting with blood splattered across their faces.
The in-engine cut scene of the battle at Ostagar was pretty awesome, though, aside from a few goofy blood splatters.

FINALLY installing it after an obscenely long download time from the worst digital distributor in the world (not Steam, but EA).

Things are getting better for me. I had to turn the difficulty down to easy to get past a scripted fight (apparently it was part of a quest). Afterwards, I went to the mages, and that changed things quite a lot.
Minor spoilers:
The reason is Wynne, who joined my team there. She's about ten times more useful than Morrigan, and ten times less bitchy as well (okay, okay, Morrigan, we get it - you hate everyone. now shut the hell up, please?). With a proper mage/healer on my team, most fights are now a lot more manageable than before.

I approached that situation with morrigan in my party and wynne decided it'd be better to die than to join me.

How did that happen? Morrigan was in my party too (with Alistair and the cute redhead)...

she was all "you have an apostate in your party?! you die!!"

Strange, that didn't happen to me. Morrigan complained about helping them (like she always does). We probably didn't select the same dialogue options.

I kept a save before then and I've been considering going back to it.

I just killed a potential companion (I only know this because of the trailers I've watched), without even a proper conversation. I felt a touch merciless really, but I was rather annoyed with them (is that a good enough reason?).
One of the things I hated about NWN2 and ME was that all the people you meet end up tagging along, even if you don't want them there (for various plot reasons usually, of which NWN2's reasoning was the worst). Glad I get some sort of choice with this one.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YrE3yf0_L1M
7 Party Members at once.
Hells yeah bitches.

Wait until Sten shows up. He's... he's just fun.
Make sure to ask him about his people. :)

But... but it's Claudia Black! And she's bantery!
...
Yeah, I know what you mean. (Chuckle.) It's kinda difficult to stay on her good side. I don't do so well playing a jackass. I like being the hero, too much, and she gets snippy if you do that too much.

* Spoilers *
I killed Zevran. I knew exactly who he was since I've been reading the Wiki and such, but I was acting in character, and in-character, my guy wouldn't leave an assassin alive at his back. At least I didn't do anything barbaric like eat him. :D

How are people finding loading times?
I have a PC well above recommended spec. and I was suprised sometimes at the loading times. I guess it comes from playing the witcher recently, which being a little bit older loads up new areas quick as lightning.

Slow. But then, my machine is pretty close to the minimum spec.