Saturday October 18th

This is the middle day of the Heartland rally. Joe French (Camping World) had agreed to buy everyone's breakfast that was prepared and served by the park. It turned out to be a great time for visiting and just sitting around talking with our extended "family" of Heartland owners.

Camping World had also sent one of their service techs named Dean, to perform any needed service work for anyone at the rally. He didn't have a lot of parts with him, and said that if someone had something that needed an adjustment or something repaired that wouldn't take long to fix, he could take care of it. This is another reason that I love my Heartland trailer. Dean started making a list at the breakfast and started to work around 9.

Jim Beletti had also hooked us up with EVDOAlex, Alex Sains of the 3G Store.com to come talk to us about mobile Internet solutions. This is a young man that really knows his business! He brought in three portable routers, one for each of the major providers, AT & T, Sprint, and Verizon. Anyone that wished to bring in their laptop could try out any one of the three for speed. He also explained about the limits placed by the providers for data and how it is actually working with users in other areas. He also explained about using a cell phone tethered to a router for internet. This is another solution, so each of us should make up our own mind about which plan to choose.

Alex also brought three antennas for use in picking up an internet signal. The first was a desktop unit that would be good in a park, where you are some distance from the internet source with few trees or other "line of sight" blocks; the second was a magnetized base unit used outside that will give increased reception when there are line of sight issues; and the third was a much larger outside antenna that gives a much longer distance reception area. I suppose there are applications for each one, but it can get confusing!

Alex was a great teacher for all of us, and he really knows his business, so our thanks go to Jim for setting it up and to Alex for driving down to put the session together. I guess its a sign of the times that Alex works for the 3G store which is in Cary Illinois, but he actually lives in Dallas. Wow, what a commute to work!

Alex stayed around all afternoon, talking to folks, selling a lot of merchandise and actually walking around looking at the rigs and making suggestions. We invited him and his wife to stay for our potluck dinner, which he did. I even saw him delivering some items to someone that had decided to buy after the supper. I told him that his boss should buy him a coach or trailer and put him on the road, going from rally to rally, show to show!

The potluck dinner went very well, with plenty of great food. Joe had brought some gift bags and lots of items for door prizes, which were given away before supper. I had gotten some free Streak-X cleaner as well as roof sealant which I gave out in the afternoon. Everyone seemd to appreciate the gifts.

This turned out to be a great ending for our last night together at the rally. We had a very tiring but great again and will be looking forward to the spring rally, April 3-5th, 2009.