Today was the best day for coverage for the whole week due to towers being close to the trail on both sides of the peak at Imogene. It was a good thing Karl chose a Verizon cell card rather then AT&T. The latter did not have great coverage in that area last year. I remeber getting text as I was driving up Imogene and the AT&T folks with no coverage. Although RVDub told me their coverage was better this year as well. Thanks to Karl for doing the live feed this year and much appreciated for those of us that could not attend this time.
What a great way to see one of our most beautiful states! I'm jealous of not being able to do something like that and grateful for being able to enjoy your rally from the canyons of Manhattan
Yesterday, the group ran Imogene Pass from Ouray to Telluride. I took a side trip up a road I had spotted to an area I think is call Silver Basin, at the base of United States Mountain. We had the entire basin blissfully to ourselves. We then caught up with the group at the top of Imogene, but descended the Ouray side with Shubie and family. We stopped and had lunch in the basin near tree line. The flowers were STUNNING, better that I have seen in the seven years of the Rally.
The Rally officially wrapped up last night with a "leftovers" party at the Ware House, which of course included plenty of leftover beer from Sarah. Today, we arrived in Evergreen after a six hour drive back and had Rickanns over as our dinner guests.
A BIGthank you to all of you that help put this rally on every year. Another BIGthank you to all of you that take the time off to come experience this event and those that drive such long distances! We are always looking for feedback so if there is something that you think that we could do better to make this event more enjoyable, please let me know!
We'll start pouring ove our pictures and posting. I would suggest to all of our participants that we create a central repository of posted pictures and I was thinking of creating a Flickr group to do so and it will allow to to tag and collect all of the pictures across multiple user. Arkarch, does Picassa do a similar thing?
I have been a fan of Picasa for several years... nice frontend; place tagging; descriptions; slideshows; music for slideshows; very embeddable into forum pages.
Not so much a fan of name tagging / facial recognition feature. Once in Google's database...
Anyway, we made it to Holbrook, AZ tonight. Looks like lots of rain in the San Juans today, after the several great days we enjoyed.
Another rally under our belt !! We arrived home about 6:30ish last night. Dawn and I were talking and both agree that this year is one of the best rallies since 2006 ! That year we had the Race T from VW and the wildflowers were spectacular ! Just like this year, minus the Race T and adding a Rover in the mix
We loved meeting the new Folks this year and catching up with the regulars! Thanks to Rick and Chris for organizing the event and a big thanks to Christina for the great logo work and Dawn for lining up the Tshirts , stickers and hats !
Gotta load up all my pics on the iMac and then will post some to the forum! The Picasa idea sounds good or I would be happy to open my MobileMe gallery and have the folks post there as well. Let mew know what folks would prefer !
Just got to Phoenix where its at least 30 degrees hotter (104) and 11,500 ft lower. I head back to Vegas tomorrow where it may be slightly cooler and slightly higher but still nowhere near where I want to be. Fuel mileage was fantastic on the way back tho!
Stopped at Geronimo's, a good petrified wood shop west of Holbrook; and La Posada in Winslow; on the way back today. Some storms. Looks like the monsoonal flow is back - watched the Ouray radar yesterday and it looks like rain has returned.
Yep, I second RvDub's note about a great rally. I was not at the 2006. But this one with the excellent weather (for the most part), flowers, and trail mix - including the Placer-Picayune loop - made this a very full and rewarding trip.
Heres' to the new folk who dared to go up the big hills with us!
Here's to those regulars who could not be here this year but we'll see them back soon.
I now got to put a hose to my Touareg. But maybe not until after I attend my local 4x4 club meet on Wednesday. I want them to know what Colorado is like
Wow cool thread... Too bad I just found it today....
My wife and I are planning a road trip. I was thinking about Ouary.... Can someone tell me how to get to those trails you guys did?
thanks
Even though we were there for a short time --- it was a blast. It always great to catch up with the "old timers" --- who we are actually fortunate enough to see during the year as well ---- and to meet the new folks.
Our visit to SW Colorado was waaaaaaaaaaay too short ---- but it was a great one.
Thanks to everyone for putting together all of this.
Total
129 Unique Viewers (reset each day)
346 Total Views
75 Viewer Hours
Sunday (Greet Party) - 24 Viewers; 3 hrs 42 min
Monday (Corkscrew, lost coverage early) - 14 Viwers; 6 hrs 10 min
Tuesday (Yankee Boy, better coverage) - 12 Viewers; 6 hrs 44 min
Wednesday (railroad, soft coverage) - 19 Viewers; 7 hrs 32 min
Thursday (Mineral Creek, up to the point) - 20 Viewers; 11 hrs 13 min
Friday (Imogene, good coverage) - 37 Viewers; 38 hrs 21 min
Friday was the best day.
As to equipment employed -
1. Logitech 615 (Mac compatible webcam)
2. MacBook 13.3 Aluminum 2.4 Core Duo
3. Adobe Flash Media Live Encoder with UStream XML control file.
4. Wi-Fi to Verizon 4510 4G-LTE MiFi card, programmed to only hunt 3G.
5. External antenna jack pigtail to Wilson Cel Amplifier 811201 Direct (10db)
6. RV-type 5db gain Cel antenna with radials mounted on Diamond 400 3/8" mount.
Nothing but Net!
Combined theoretical gain 15 db minus of cable loss of 1 to 3 db.
Setup is somewhat bounded by what it can hear - 3-5db or 2-3X gain; but if it does, it transmits strong data signal at 16 - 32X.
I have most of the video files archived. I plan to edit them (mostly dead spots) and find a home for them on the servers.
I'll post next public use - likely Hump-N-Bump (vv4w.org) in November.
Arkarch, first off, the footage was great to watch for those of us who couldn't make it; although, we are planning on heading out next year
Secondly, where did you did you mount the Diamond antenna mount? I was thinking about getting one to house a Larsen 150/450/800 antenna and mount it on the hatch...
I've done a few "live-feeds" before for various meets/drives; however none went to the equipment level of yours... in the past I've usually used a camcorder to laptop to Ustream via tethered cell coverage; very impressive!
Arkarch, first off, the footage was great to watch for those of us who couldn't make it; although, we are planning on heading out next year
Secondly, where did you did you mount the Diamond antenna mount? I was thinking about getting one to house a Larsen 150/450/800 antenna and mount it on the hatch...
I've done a few "live-feeds" before for various meets/drives; however none went to the equipment level of yours... in the past I've usually used a camcorder to laptop to Ustream via tethered cell coverage; very impressive!
I removed the channel from atop the Touareg. If you have the longitudinal roof rails found on the '09 and beyond, you'll need to remove those first.
Once removed, I drilled holes in the channel from underneath to access the set screws. I drilled a hole in the 'tab' part to mount ground strap to one of the channel mounting holes (its encased in wide heat shrink). I have one on either side of the vehicle to mount all sorts of antennas depending on need, including CB, Cel, VHF whip, and HF screw.
Interesting mount, that's certainly a good idea, although, for parking garages I'm tempted to order the power-folding Diamond mount.
Power isn't an issue at all for me, I have 0 gauge connecting the main battery to a D75/25 Yellowtop in the rear through an isolator; it solely feeds a 12v distribution block + 880w inverter. Also, for now the 150/450/800 would be for my scanner, VHF/UHF isn't in the plans for a little while
Hehe, yeah, I live in Vegas and I have to very aware of Parking Garage clearances. Sounds like you have the power thing covered in a similar way. I tossed the text - but just to recap, using the West Mountain ISO-Pwr with 4 Guage and an Optima Yellow Top in the trunk. West Mtn Power Pole blocks.
Now that we've been home a couple nights, I'm finally getting a chance to post a 'best of' set of rally images for Wednesday through Friday. So here's the first one--for Rick's excellent side trip on Wednesday to the Red Mountain Mining District. This one may be a keeper!
have a new (to me) 2006 Touareg TDI (v10 but not sure that makes a difference). A few days ago the drivers side low beam stopped working and gave me the "check headlights" message on the screen.
Took me a bit to figure out how to remove the headlight assembly but I did so, realized I had HID...
On my 2013 TDI, the trailer brake controller cable harness plug is visible by looking up through the opening on the left side of the steering wheel. It can be reached with your right hand without removing the lower panel. Reach up through the opening next to the firewall where the steering link...
Since the gallery web app that I used to host was hacked a few years ago and was subsequently taken down, we have been missing many of the good pictures spanning the last 5 years or Colorado Rally. In the days leading up to the Rally, I'll start posting up some of what I considered the BEST...
runNride · updated 
aircooled · updated 
