Cruise-In Drew Modest Crowd Despite Weather

Through a cloudy and overcast beginning, the Third Annual Cruise-In enjoyed warm sunshine, cold blustery rain and back to a thick cloud cover all during the six-hour period of the event. Despite the weather anomalies 38 persons signed in of which 14 were non-club members. Some of the discussion groups enjoyed the rapt attention of a goodly number of attendees. Some radios were programmed and some equipment traded hands during the swap meet part of the day. The HF GOTO station drew a lot of attention and attracted a few potential amateurs. There was a great deal of interest in the vehicle wiring demo and many confessed to learning from the experience. The largest group of the day surrounded the Solar Power demo which occurred during the brightest and warmest part of the entire day. Jay Jennings W4BSB from Virginia Beach stated, “I am happy to report that the demo’s of the Internet remote access to HF stations for the Third Annual Virginia Ham Radio Cruise-in in Charlottesville, VA went extremely well considering that propagation on HF was very poor. Thanks to Gary, WA5FWC, who jumped in and logged 20+ check-in’s from the Venus, Texas station and the 17 hams who logged into the Virginia Beach, Virginia remote station via the Internet. There were some Verizon broadband “Hot Spot” ( latency ) issues at the public park in Charlottesville however we were able to hear loud and clear using the Yaesu FT-857D in the W4BSB – SUV. This was very impressive to those who gathered around the SUV before the rain set in for the day. The temperature went from 61 degrees to 51 degrees in less than one hour…. Burr!

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