VP5/WA9ALS - VP5RY Family DXpedition
Whitby, North Caicos, British West Indies

(Best viewed at 800 x 600. These will take awhile to load, depending on your connection. There will still be new updates to this page as I get my "real" [film] camera photos back)

Tuesday, 2 January 2001

Enroute at last - somewhere between Miami and Providenciales Provo). It sure doesn't look like snow down there! (We left a lot of snow and 15 deg F behind.) We flew American Airlines nonstop from Indianapolis, IN to Miami, then nonstop to Provo.

Tuesday, 2 January 2001

Things got a little slow at the Provo airport on arrival. It took quite a bit of time to get checked through the international arrival area - a little too long for 5-yr-old Sarah Jo. Phyllis and her mother took a taxi to buy groceries for a week while the rest of us "bargained" for our fare for the trip from Provo over to North Caicos. We ended up spending 3 hrs at the Provo airport, but apparently that's very unusual. (We noticed that the Indy airport was very busy this January 2nd also.) There were MANY grocery bags - think about buying water for a week + milk etc! The prices were more than Indiana, but not too bad considering.

Tuesday, 2 January 2001

Here's my view of the taxiway!

Tuesday, 2 January 2001

WHEW - A safe arrival on North Caicos! That's our pilot, Donny Gardniner on the wing, also a ham. Having been a VFR pilot myself, I note that he did a great job with the cross wind landing. We almost didn't make it in time - There was a storm moving in, and watching the clouds closing up and getting darker (like Indiana in the spring!) made the delay at Provo a little uncomfortable.

Wednesday, 3 January 2001

Remnants of the storm last night - still a little windy, but Bud's tower and antennas are still up! At this point it even looked like the sun might be coming back out, but see below!

Wednesday, 3 January 2001

Amazingly, the wires are still up too! For a bit it looked like it would clear up, but then if became overcast. The wind continued all day. Wesley and I rode a motor scooter about 10 miles away and then had a flat tire. We got a ride with a nice local fellow that took us and the bike home in the back of his truck - we felt right at home!

Thursday, 4 January 2001

Well, it's 5:30 PM EST - The WX is definitely NOT improving! It's raining, and the wind is howling! Oh well, we're playing cards, watching TV (when we don't lose the satellite signal), and hamming!

Friday, 5 January 2001 - SUNRISE!



This could be the turning point - Looks like the weather will be the opposite of last night, when we must have had 40 MPH wind with rain.

5 January 2001

Sun, and the antennas are still up! It can't get any better than this, right?

I had a little RTTY pileup going for a short time last night, but I didn't really have the Writelog macros setup for DXpedition Mode optimally. Today I will operate some 10M SSB and hope to try MFSK16 with Stream. I also need to check the wire "extenders" on the 80M dipole that bring the resonance down into the RTTY/CW subband.

Friday, 5 January 2001

We are all very glad to see the sun, and the kids are having a great time. They even enjoyed the rain!

Friday, 5 January 2001

Sun's out, but check out the breeze in the palms. A light breeze is welcomed here, as it keeps away the mosquitos and No-See-Ums.
Friday, 5 January 2001

Now this is really living! Unfortunately the ocean doesn't show in this picture due to the flash, but we'll do better next time. Today I contacted K3DSP, KK7UQ, and ON7GB via MFSK16 - I believe the first time for this mode from North Caicos, and probably the first time from VP5! I hope to get on MFSK16 some more tonight before final preparations for the RTTY Roundup.
This is the operating position with the view to K and JA out the window - great to hear the surf instead of freezing during a contest like I'm accustomed.
Friday 5 January 2001

This is closer to the final operating configuration for the RTTY Roundup. My laptop and the external keyboard are sitting in front of Bud's monitor. The FT-1000MP is to the left. On top of it on the right is my FSK/PTT interface. To the right of the keyboard on the blue mousepad is my new USB infrared mouse. I like it a lot - thanks to the staff at my office! It's plugged into a D-Link USB hub seen hanging on a rubber band from the top shelf. Between the lamp and the Yaesu G-2800SDX control box is the Belkin USB serial adapter that's reading freq and mode from the 1000MP - It's dark purple and black and doesn't show well. Just above the D-link USB hub is the White Heat USB serial adapter that was to provide 4 additional serial ports that would have allowed 2R operation with my Icom 706MKIIG. However, just before we left, it quit functioning, and I never got it back. It happened during installation of the USB hub and USB mouse - Somehow the previous installation of the White Heat drivers got at least partially deleted/foulded up, and I never could get it reinstalled successfully, despite some expert help. It's possible that something failed in the hardware, but it's probably a Windows issue. (Isn't everything?)
Saturday morning 6 January 2001



Come on now! This is getting ridiculous! ;-) Oh well, as long as there's no lightning and radio propagation is good, I'm not complaining. Today and tomorrow are contest days! This will be the last photo update until Sunday night or Monday. Good luck to all in the contest!
Sunday morning starts the second "day" of the contest. I operated from 1PM local time on Saturday until 3AM Sunday, then off for 6 hrs of sleep.
Monday 8 January 2001

Ahhhh... Now this is more like the WX we expected! After a long 24 hrs in the contest chair, this is great relief!
Monday 8 January 2001

Gee, I'd like to go back to Indiana, but... I haven't had a Monday morning like this for awhile!
Monday 8 January 2001

The kids continue to have a great time. We could see some fish, even up close to the beach.
Monday 8 January 2001
Monday 8 January 2001
Monday 8 January 2001
Monday 8 January 2001



The view to K and JA (USA and Japan).
Monday 8 January 2001



The view to EU (Europe).
Monday 8 January 2001
Monday 8 January 2001

Grandma Miller
Monday 8 January 2001
Monday 10 January 2001
Monday 10 January 2001
Monday 10 January 2001
Monday 10 January 2001

Monday was a good day!
Tuesday 11 January 2001

The trip home was very complicated! It had nothing to do with visiting a remote island - It was just a lot of BAD LUCK! We spent about 8 hrs in the Provo airport before finally departing on what was to become a long journey home. We had breakfast AND lunch at Gilley's in the airport - lunch was compliments of American Airlines.
Tuesday 11 January 2001

We spent a LOT of time in Gilley's!
Tuesday 11 January 2001

On the moving sidewalk at Atlanta.
Tuesday 11 January 2001

Next stop - Indianapolis! We arrived in Indy at 1AM Wednesday instead of the expected 2:30 PM Tuesday. Everyone's spirits remained amazingly good. About half-way between Atlanta and Indianapolis, I realized we didn't have the vehicle keys with us - They were far, far away back on North Caicos! ;-)