Spring 2003 Issue

Barging Through Britain Part II

In Part 2 of this article, WB5TGF explained how he prepared for his trip to Britain to travel on the canals and operate ham radio. This time he tells of the fun—and the trials and tribulations—faced along the way.

By Ron Davis,* WB5TGF
 

We had the canal to ourselves. Under blue skies, this was our last day on the water. (Photo by WB5TGF’s XYL, Bernadette)

But, Mousie, thou art no thy lane,
In proving foresight may be vain;
The best-laid schemes o’ mice an ‘men
Gang aft agley.
lines from “To A Mouse”
by Robert Burns

Murphy’s Law,”If anything can go wrong, it will,” was born here at Edwards Air Force Base in 1949 at North Base. It was named after Capt. Edward A. Murphy, an engineer working on Air Force Project MX981, a project designed to see how much sudden deceleration a person can stand in a crash.
The Desert Wings, March 3, 1978

The authors of these two quotations know of what they speak. Our plans for this trip, including contingency plans, had been carefully laid out, but alas…it was not to be!
If you missed the first installment of this article in the Winter 2003 edition of CQ VHF, here is a brief recap. My wife, Bernadette, who is the real journalist in the family, was given a trip on a barge on the canals of The Midlands of England. I saw this trip as a great opportunity to do some amateur radio operating. In preparation, I bought a Yaesu VX5-R, and with the proper paperwork and radio programming I could operate on 6 meters, 2 meters, and 70 cm while traveling the canals. This second installment finds us at Gatwick Airport, London, England.

On the Road

Once Bernadette and I had cleared customs, we headed to the rental agency to pick up our (slightly larger than compact) car. In Britain they drive on the opposite side of the road from us here in the U.S., and the steering wheel is on the right side of the car, forcing the driver to shift with the left hand. Realizing that my dyslexia was not going to be of any help, I initially let Bernadette do the driving. We made it out to the dual carriageway (four-lane highway) without any mishaps. I grabbed the VX5 and powered it up. I pressed the scan button, and within seconds I heard two guys operating mobile, complaining about the amount of road traffic and the ineptitude of the other drivers. Does this topic of conversation sound familiar? They were using UHF. Later I learned that most of the radio traffic is on UHF.

Because of the rain I put away the HT so I could help Bernadette watch for traffic and for our turns. When I made a comment about the rain, Bernadette reminded me that this was typical English winter weather. What we didn’t know at the time was that our trip would not be anything typical anything.

Our first task was to find the timeshare lodging where we were going to stay for the first two days. Bernadette’s sister, who was having a Christmas party at the lodging for her friends and family, had made the arrangements. The place turned out to be an old country estate near Stratford-on-Avon, the home town of William Shakespeare. Two of those typical winter-weather wet days were spent with Bernadette’s relatives.

While there, we visited Stratford and several standing stone sites. It was a good thing we had brought an umbrella. I did some monitoring of the ham bands and shortwave broadcasts. As the days passed, I could hardly wait to get to the boat and hook up the mobile antennas so I could do some communicating.
 

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Barging Through Britain Part II

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