• Re: Austin, Texas

    From Vk3jed@VERT/FREEWAY to Daryl Stout on Tuesday, July 11, 2017 09:01:00
    Daryl Stout wrote to TONY LANGDON <=-

    <moved to General> :)

    I mentioned it in another message...but after getting bumped coming
    back to Little Rock from a trip to Dallas several years ago, a round
    trip from Little Rock to Orlando cost me only $17, thanks to the
    voucher!!

    Nice one. :)

    Indeed, and the company as well. Being an international visitor really
    elp
    in that way. :)

    It really does. Ham radio operators are some of the most CHEAPSKATE...er, FRUGAL...individuals you'll ever meet. But, by and
    large, most of them are happy to break bread with, and even offer
    lodging, to a visiting ham radio operator.

    Yes, those friendships that form over the radio are among the highlights of the hobby. That was an interesting period in my life. I was heavily involved in the VoIP WX Net, having done some major upgrades to the server the net uses. I was not long off completing development of EchoIRLP, and I had a network of contacts over there. Circumstances also gave me a brief window, I had gone into business in early 2004, and had put away quite a bit of money, mainly to make sure I could cover my next tax bill, but I had been very conservative and severely overestimated the amount of tax I needed to put aside - not only did I have enough to pay for my US trip, I also had a deposit for a house by late 2004. :)

    Anyway, the stars aligned for a 2005 trip. First, there was the IRLP conference in mid April in Vegas. I booked myself a spot in that and while plans were underway, the VoIP WX crew talked about having a BBQ, initially someahat in jest, but I said if they made it the week after the IRLP conference, I'd probably be there. That pretty much kickstarted more concrete plans for a weekend get together in Nacogdoches, TX.

    Then the hams I knew lined up to meet. :) The trip ended up going like this:

    April 12 (Tuesday) flew out to the US, landed in LAX "40 minutes after" I left Melbourne. Stayed near San Diego with a ham friend Tuesday 12th - Friday morning (15th). Had another mutual ham friend staying with him too.

    Friday was road trip day, with my ham mate driving, complete with traffic jam east of LA which caused a couple hours delay. Arrived in Vegas, checked into the hotel and then arrived at a pre-conference dinner only a few minutes late. :) Ham mate stayed with me at the hotel on the Friday night and drove home on the Saturday.

    Saturday and Sunday (16th and 17th) were the conference. I spoke on the Saturday about my work on EchoIRLP and then unveiled the then new "integrated conference" technology you'd be familiar with (though today's version is a more advanced one, developed in 2009). I also helped Lu KA4EPS with his presentation on the use of VoIP dueing the Florida hurricanes of 2004. He gave the account from ground zero, while I was able to give the corresponding picture from Net Control. After the conference finished around lunchtime Sunday, I went on a trip with some locals to Hoover Dam.

    Monday (18th), I departed Vegas for Austin, TX. I had met up with my next host in Vegas, who has come over for the conference. He, the other ham visotor from the previous week (who also lived in TX) and myself flew this leg. Stayed at his place the next 4 nights, and spent a couple of days doing trips around the Austin area.

    Friday (22nd), this time I flew solo from Austin to Houston, met up with several of my VoIP WX crew, who had arranged to converge at Bush Airport around the same time. My flight was the last one due in, and a few minutes late, due to a minor departure delay. One of the guys rented a people mover, and was our driver. Had lunch at an awesome seafood restaurant in Houston, before the 2 hour trip to Nacogdoches. Funnily enough, I actually had to do the final stage of navigation to our destination. Once I had oriented myself with the map, that turned out to be easy. My orienteering background came in handy! :D

    Friday (22nd) - Sunday (24th) - the VoIP WX get together. Friday night, we had a Texas BBQ and briefly went out. Saturday turned out to be a mini conference.
    I ended up being a speaker, pretty much repeating my previous week's presentaion to another audience, so the group now knew what the future was for their systems (I can't recall if the changeover happened just before or just after that trip). The end of the day saw a BBQ and participating in the week's net. It sure felt strange having it on a Saturday evening, instead of a Sunday morning! :)

    Sunday (24th) - Monday (25th) - Back to Austin for my last night in the US.

    Monday 25th - the long trip back starts, left Austin in the middle of the day, flew out of LAX around 9:30 PM, landed in Melbourne around 8AM on Wednesday 27th. Tuesday only lasted a couple of hours, until crossing the International Date Line over the Pacific in the wee small hours.

    Yep, ham radio can lead you all sorts of places. :)


    ... Lose an hour in the morning and you will spend all day looking for it.
    --- MultiMail/Win32 v0.49
    þ Synchronet þ Freeway BBS in Bendigo, Australia.
  • From Daryl Stout@VERT/TBOLT to VK3JED on Tuesday, July 11, 2017 09:30:00
    Tony,

    Yep, ham radio can lead you all sorts of places. :)

    Wow...what an itinerary. Unfortunately, with medical and financial
    issues, travel for me outside of central Arkansas is over. :(

    The funny thing is that you form mental images of the person you talk
    to on the air...then when you meet them in person, they do NOT look at
    all like you pictured!! :P

    Daryl

    ---
    þ OLX 1.53 þ Police station toilets stolen. Cops have nothing to go on
    þ Synchronet þ The Thunderbolt BBS - wx1der.dyndns.org
  • From Vk3jed@VERT/FREEWAY to Daryl Stout on Wednesday, July 12, 2017 08:20:00
    Daryl Stout wrote to VK3JED <=-

    Yep, ham radio can lead you all sorts of places. :)

    Wow...what an itinerary. Unfortunately, with medical and financial issues, travel for me outside of central Arkansas is over. :(

    Yeah, financial issues are my main limitation, though circumstances allow me to get the occasional funded interstate trip. I'm going to have to work out how to afford sporting trips, which at my age are _much_ harder to get funded. :( But national level competition will mean interstate travel. 2005 was a unique window of opportunity.

    The funny thing is that you form mental images of the person you talk
    to on the air...then when you meet them in person, they do NOT look at
    all like you pictured!! :P

    LOL true! :)


    ... Dehydrated Water! Just add water for a refreshing beverage! Order now!
    --- MultiMail/Win32 v0.49
    þ Synchronet þ Freeway BBS in Bendigo, Australia.
  • From JIMMY ANDERSON@VERT/OTHETA to DARYL STOUT on Friday, July 28, 2017 08:45:00
    DARYL STOUT wrote to VK3JED <=-

    The funny thing is that you form mental images of the person you talk
    to on the air...then when you meet them in person, they do NOT look at
    all like you pictured!! :P

    Same thing when you work telephone sales and then you meet the people...





    ... Dr. Livingston I. Presume (Dr. Presume's full name)
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