Kenetic Race, Day 3

We're getting lazy. Today, we let the race come to us. The fairgrounds here in Ferndale is a holding point for the racers before they parade into town. There was an earlier Memorial Day parade down town, then the Kinetic parade and street fair. Such a small town and so much to do! Anyway, by 1030 the racers started appearing, one, by one. At noon, there was a Le Mans style restart of the race, which was quite exciting. We then walked down town for the street fair. Our favorite sculpture is "Sparkle The Horse".

Kenetic Race, Day 2

The second day of the race starts in downtown Eureka. All the sculptures launch into the bay and parade in the water in front of the boardwalk. There was a wonderful band playing. There instruments looked like they came from the dump, but sounded great. Some of the sculptures worked well in the water, others looked like a reason for the safety patrol boats. The race continues out to the beach at the end of the eel river. We didn't follow them today, we went back up to Arcata to look around somemore.

Kenetic Race, First Day

The Kinetic Race starts in Arcata at the downtown square. We watched the start and looked over as many of the entrants as we could. There was quite a crowd so getting near some of them wasn't easy. After the start, they all go around the square three times before heading out toward the beach. We then drove out to the Manila Dunes where they all had to go over the dunes, then down the beach to Deadman's Drop, a steep drop down a sand dune. They then head for downtown Eureka for the night. Here are some pictures of some of the racers heading down to the beach at Manila Dunes.

Ferndale For The Kenetic Sculpture Race

We did some final packing to depart. I powered up the Motosat and it acquired the satellite in just a couple of minutes. I didn't have time to do more before we departed.
We dashed North to Ferndale just after the morning rush. We had heavy traffic until we were North of Healdsberg. It was then an easier drive the rest of the way. We arrived in Ferndale at the Humbolt County Fairgrounds. We parked and I, of course, raised the Motosat antenna. It got the satellite right away. I then had to get my laptop to connect to the Internet. I had stopped off and got a new crossover Ethernet cable. That seemed to make the difference. It might have been a bad cable that came with the One-Touch Nap. We connected at 700k+.
We went over to the Cookhouse on the Samoa Peninsula for dinner.
It's neat to be parked in a cow pasture and connected to the internet!

Getting Our Motosat

I am in Visalia today at the Wooden Shoe RV park. I came to get our Motosat antenna installed by Impact Wireless. A crew of four arrived about 11am and hefted the antenna to the roof. Michael Lewis spent quite a while getting the antenna installed just right. After a little commissioning and calibration the connection was made. The first test at 2wire showed 200k, not great. Subsequent tests were 600k, 2.5m, and 3m. We weren't able to get my laptop to connect to the internet, but Michaels worked Ok. Due to it getting late and my having to get back to Palo Alto to head North on Friday, I was satisfied that we had made the connection and I would followup on my laptop's problem. I had dinner at Las Palmas restaurant downtown. I got back to Palo Alto at 1130pm. A long day but we now have the Motosat!

At home with new Motosat on roof. Sorry, Best picture so far.

Rules Of Travel

We're the sort that don't like to make reservations and don't really know where we will go, or at least not how we will go, until the last moment. We have a group of interests that help guide us in our decisions. Likes and dislikes. We like waterfalls, caves, forests, ponds, bogs etc. We like fairs, steam trains, antique equipment, museums, book stores etc. Some of us can't pass up a garage sale or flea market. These factors all influence our route selection and itinerary. We can travel very fast,even continuously, or take days to do a short distance or stay put for long periods. Our favorite areas are where the crowds aren't. As you may be able to see, there aren't really any rules.

Preparing To Leave

Don was planning on retiring in late October. Things change and now, due to early retirement incentives, he'll retire the end of June. Shortly thereafter we'll take an extended trip returning in September. In a couple of weeks we'll get our Motosat antenna installed. Hopefully by departure a new larger battery array will be installed. We may stop in Arizona to get some solar panels on the trip. So much to do and so little time. Right now work gets in the way.