A TV and PC

[RanCarr]

Re: Electronics

Almost every evening we'd find someone to hang out with around a fire or at a picnic table. Sometimes large groups would form around someone's campsite. Not anymore. :?

I thought I was the only one who noticed that change over the years...

Time was, you could hardly ever do campfire alone on your own site. You'd either end up with all the neighbors at your place or you'd quickly get invited to join someone else's at campfire.

The SunlineClub.com Meet and Greets are a notable exception to this trend, just like most camping club outings. And there are darned few camping clubs left.

I can hardly get most neighbors to even say hello, let alone have a real conversation.

Best time we had in this regard was camping up in the Adirondacks for 10 days in mid-June this year. It was all empty-nesters like us (school doesn't get out until the 3rd week of June around here) and you could not take the dog for a walk without stopping at nearly every site to chat.

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Steve, Anyone who started camping in the later 80s or 90s probably wouldn't know what camping was like back in the 70s and before. I had a friend who complained as early as the late 80s that unless they went camping with a few friends, they'd end up alone at the CGs. I thought she was exaggerating. There seems to be a different breed of camper out there nowadays. I'm sure some campers are looking for camping camraderie, but most clearly are not. They may say a few words but quickly move on. And the number who don't even leave their rigs really surprised me. Why go camping to sit inside and watch TV or play on a PC? That seems so pointless to me. There are people who look away when someone is walking by their campsite. We ran into mostly empty-nesters and retired people on our trip to NY in Sept. They were no more friendly than the younger people. The older folks, I would say 60 and up, were the ones who spent most of their time in their rigs. :? At one Campground a couple did wander over and talk for awhile, but we were packing it up to leave. The day before the woman was staggering around their site drunk...

 

[RanCarr]

We have been VERY fortunate to find ourselves in a camping group down here in south Georgia. Actually, we're in TWO.

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I have been unable to find any camping clubs or groups here in middle TN. I've Googled and Yahood and came up empty handed.

 

[RanCarr]

Re: Getting on line

The Verizon Wireless is very good. I was able to get a good signal at the Meet and Greet at OLd Forge and all the way across the country; we are now in Seattle.

As to using librarys and the like. I to generally write my emails at night but during the day while out and about I can stop in front of a library, or in Canada at a CAP center and in an hour do all my Internet work. In the USA I never have to go to a library with Verizon Wireless.

Weekend camping and fulltime camping are two different animals. As fulltimers you do everything yo need to do to live versus going home after the weekend or the week when you can handle the every day aspects of your life, paying bills, visiting with families, catching up on news.

For example on the road we rarely get oir local newspapers and never magazines, just too much hassle but the Internet provides all that and more. We are in constant touch with friends and family via email and actually spend more time with our far away kids than we might if they lived in the same town. For example I'm parked in my son's yard for a month right now.

Norm and Ginny Milliard

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When our contract runs out with the Satellite Co. we will look into Verizon wireless. Too many places we stayed did not have wi-fi. We don't want to make that a deciding factor of where to camp because the internet is how we stay in touch with family also. We want internet access. It's also entertainment for us at night since the campgrounds we've stayed at are pretty dead after dinnertime. Nothing like they were back in "the good old days." For the most part we stay at the CG and don't wander around the area or nearby cities and towns.

 

[Hematite]

I bring the cell phone for an emergency and I have brought the computer, but I prefer not to.

I will NOT, however, go anywhere without my 32" HD TV with DVD player!

 

[emam]

Much like Norm, I cant imagine NOT having them with us. We have two flat screens in our 2499. One in the living room and one in the bedroom. Both always stay in the camper, but then again, where would I bring them out to as the camper is our home...LOL

As for computers, I sometimes am amazed at this myself, but we carry 3. One fullsize one that is named the Mother Ship because of it's terabyte hard drive and componets that make it amazing fast for photography work and graphics, and this sucker is always hooked up to the 23" Plasma in the living room. It also acts as our DVD player and sound system since the computer has a great soundcard and is hooked up to the speakers and subwoofer.

Rather than carry a bunch of CD's along with us, I just ripped everything to a harddrive on the computer that only has music on it, and it acts as a mobile jukebox for times we want to have music accompany the campfire. There is so much music on here, when most people start to look through the harddrive, the get completely lost. This is also what we used to run the bar's sound system with, so it ranges anywhere from Country, to Rock-N-Roll to classical to 50's, 60's, and opera.

Cindy and I each have our own laptops as she pays all the bills with hers and I work on all the photo stuff with mine. We have 3 externial 500 gig hard drives to back everything up on, and a few little 300gig USB powered hard drives that stay in the camera bag so we can download stuff while we're driving or work on things while on the move.

With the Wilson Amplifier, our phones and Broadband card almost always have a signal no matter how far out in the boonies we're camped. I dont know how many times we've been camped in some secluded campsite when another camper will see one of us on our cell phones. Once they find out we have an amplifier, we find them standing around our campsite to make a phone call they thought they were going to have to go into town to make

So all in all, I cant imagine camping, if you even want to call it that, without all our gadgets and gear. It just makes it all so comfortable and as long as we have sun, we have power!

 

[Tweety]

Pat...can we have some details on the Wilson Amplifier? It seems like we're always camping where there's no cell signal.

 

[emam]

There are a few different amplifiers out there, but Wilson sets the standard for which all others try to copy.

http://store.getreception.com/

What we found was by getting a dual band amplifier, one that boosts our cell phone signal and our braodband signal, both broadcast at different frequencies, we very rarely lose a signal connection.

I was able to hook it up myself, as it consists of a simple amplifier, a amplifier that boosts the signal, and another antenna that must be mounted inside the camper.

If you're not fulltiming and say get bad reception in your house, they make set-ups that don not need to be hard mounted. You would simply set it up at camp and be boosting the signal right away. Then when you get home, you could bring the set-up into the house to get better connection while at home, on the boat or even at the cottage per say.

Now remember, if there is no signal available, the amplifier isnt going to create one, like what a satillite does, but what we've found is if we're within 50 miles of a signal, we'll be able to get a connection.

Here is a very indepth review I posted on our website about what it took to install it, and how it looks fully installed.

http://www.everymilesamemory.com/wilson_electronics_page.htm

Hope that helps. For us fulltiming, it was so worth the cost. Many of the places we like to camp are out in the sticks. We almost never had a signal and a few times missed very important calls or needed to pack up camp and move to a more populated area to get reception.

By putting this amlifier in the camper, now we are rarely without signal, and figure in the past year, it has saved us what we spent on it in campground fees.