We were due to leave Cairns tomorrow (11th), but we’re staying now until the 13th.
Category Archives: General
Darwin, Katherine and Uluru
Tuesday evening we went for a Sunset Cruise with City of Darwin Cruises. Sipping Champers while the Sun goes down isn’t a bad way to spend an evening. Many thanks to Chris (Skipper), James (Deckhand) and Oscar (Beer provider/drinker/fisherman extraordinare).
Wednesday morning we got a phone call about 6am to say my bag had arrived and would be dispatched to the hotel as soon as possible. It arrived about 20 minutes later, 36 packets of Taytos still intact. We toddled down the street to Salvatores for brekkie, a very nice place. Following that we collected our bags and boarded the Ghan, reputedly the second greatest train journey in the world.
All was going well until we got off the Train in Katherine. We joined our tour bus and headed off. Our first port of call was an (closed) Abbatoir… then it got worse. I’m certain the driver was a few cans short of a sixpack. She had a serious problem with Gumtrees & African Mahogany trees, and considered that the “Automatic” door of the post office was something to talk about. We weren’t the only people on the bus that thought we had been kidnapped. Eventually, we escaped and made it back to the Ghan unharmed.
The Journey itself (20 Hours) was relatively uneventful. A very civilised way of travelling. After the Sun went down, we were in front row seats for a magnificent light show given by Mother Nature.
We arrived in Alice Springs Thursday morning and quickly left for Uluru National Park. The Highlights of the stay being the Sunset Tour of the Olgas, and the Sunrise Tour of Uluru (5 am this morning. Off we headed again on our merry way to Cairns. The lowlights being the crap food and everything being a bit too pricey.
Arriving here in Cairns, we collected $200 for my bag being missing for two days, its now nearly 21:30 here (and we’ve had quite a bit of wine), so its time to head for another drink or five and off to bed.
Tomorrow is another day….
Out and about in Darwin
Had a look around yesterday and this morning. Had a sniff around Stokes hill wharf, the Indo Pacific Marine Exhibition and the Aviation Heritage Centre yesterday. The B52 is a bloody big bus. did the Historical stuff this morning. The Bombing of Darwin and Hurricane Tracey are big events in the history of Darwin.
Still no bags, hopefully they will turn up before we get the train south to Alice Springs in the morning.
Made it!
Well, not entirely. My bag is currently en-route here via Bali, it took a wrong turn in Frankfurt and is taking the scenic route. Armed with $200 from Quantas, we went on a shopping spree and I purchased a wide brimmed Aussie Hat (much to Deirdre’s annoyance).
After about 40 hours on the go, we finally caved about lunchtime (Australia) Sunday afternoon… sleeeeeeep……
Changi
Made it this far anyway, an uneventful, though long flight. What an airport. The Dublin Airport Authority could do with visiting Changi and taking notes, lots of notes. Now, do I go for a swim or go listen to one of the two (yes two) live acts. Maybe I’ll sit down and have a drink while thinking about it. Gotta run, a saxaphone solo just started..
Down Under!
Taking Jonathan Brazil’s advice (“5 days a year just ain’t enough”, I agree Jonathan), the boss and I are heading “down under” for a little bit longer than a week. We haven’t had any “downtime” in a while so this should help to re-charge the batteries. I had intended to post about building an APRS Satellite ground station before heading away, but it will have to wait 🙂
Project Argo
Earlier this year (late June/early) I was informed that there was an 8 wheel drive “ATV” type vehicle sitting idle in someones back garden and would I be interested in it (as if I would say no!). I was told it was was sitting on a trailer and both it and the trailer were in need of some work.
It turned out that it was an old ARGO, this one had obviously had a hard life. It was still on its trailer and both were in pretty bad shape, but niether Jim (my dad) or I were brave enough to try towing it behind our cars as it was quite a bit bigger than we had imagined. Tommy, EI2IT, volunteered to tow it with his Jeep. One sunday afternoon in June, Tommy, Jim and I headout out to the site, pumped the tyres on the trailer and headed (slowly) back to Clonmel to my parents house (much to my Mothers delight!).
Unfortunately, I was extremely busy workwise for most of summer, so Jim worked away on it pretty much on his own. The list of things to be done were (not a complete or ordered list):
- Rebuild the engine (it was seized).
- Free the chain drives (rusted).
- Replace the bearings on the drive shafts.
- Free the brakes (and replace perished seals)
- Free the Winch
This is the first picture I got to take of it (July 24th, 2005):
At this stage Jim had it off the trailer, the top off, and had ascertained that the engine and the drives were all seized.
To make a long story short, this is what it looks like today (13th November 2005):
All the pictures I took, at the various stages of work are here.
Hopefully, at some stage early next year, EI7TRG will be mobile somewhere on the side of Slievenamon, after getting in some driving practice, and then parking up and operating a portable station for a few hours.
eChallenges 2005
![[aerial photo]](http://www.ijs.si/slo/ljubljana/images/slo-lj-aerial.jpg)
I’m just back from Ljubljana in Slovenia for the annual eChallenges 2005 conference. This year there are nearly 600 delegates from 46 countries. The conference looks at a broad range of topics, from eBusiness, through eGovernment to Broadband and Mobile technologies. There were a few TSSG personnel present but unfortunately we had very little time to look around. If you are looking for a place to have a few beers in slightly different surroundings, may I suggest visiting The Skeleton Pub quite a busy place, and the owner (who looks like/is a bouncer) was quite interested to hear where we all were from. In those unforgettable words of Arnold…. I’ll be back.
In Moray Firth, East Scotland.
We’re in Moray Firth with about 40 miles to go to Inverness and the entrance to the Caledonian Canal. This canal cuts across Scotland through Loch Ness and The Great Glen, and will have us out on the Scottish west coast.
Continue reading here.
In the fishing town of MALOY and a Rocket Launch
Northabout
We know it’s 6 days since we sent any word, but we didn’t want to appear complaining, and wished to send good news only.
The good news is that Maloy is a very nice place and the people we have met couldn’t be more obliging. There was one good day, we plotted for Scotland and measured the distance to the Caledonian Canal, and Westport, in days. Not to be.
Read the rest here.
A Rocket Launch at Sunset. An explanation
