The AM Forum

Who's heading to hosstraders?  Camping out?  I'm thinking of doing my first campout there instead of rushing up Saturday for a couple hours and rushing back home.

I went there for the first time last fall and had a great time. I just passed out in the auto and slept surprisingly well. :D  I hope to make it back there this spring.

We will be there  Friday afternoon, camping. I've been off the air for a month  had take down my station.........hope to back soon at my mom's house, lot is small will have to be creative for a effective antenna system.  My new email address is Ka1bwo@highstream.net........ see you all  at the fest
Joe

a large amount of beer helps sleeping in weird positions.

When is the fester?

5/6 & 5/7

The reason I'm asking is this may be my first and last chance to meet some of the AM gang face to face. I'll be moving down to North Carolina next spring and It would be a shame not to hang with the gang at least once before I head south.... Any idea how many hours drive time from the southern NY, NYC area? I have a mini van with only the front seats installed (room for my RC planes) so plenty of room to crash in the back

Starting from:     Monsey, NY 10952
Arriving at:       Contoocook, NH 03229
Distance:       256.4 miles    
Approximate Travel Time:    5 hours 15 mins

Closer than North Carolina!

 :D

Only 10 miles, 20 minutes for me...

Thanks Jack!.... yes indeed closer than NC  :D

Ill  be there Friday AM early...sleep in my van......leave Saturday about 2PM.
Hope to see ya all there!!!!!!

Not to fret Glenn. Lots of great hamfesters in NC and surrounding states.
To name a few: Charlotte in early Spring, Winston-Salem in June, and Shelby in Sep. Always lots of great stuff to drag home from these places. You might even see hams from Jersey at these places.

Lotsa guys sleeping in vans.  Promises to be a fragrant hamfest!

I heard Shelby is a great fest, but it's the not lack of festers that I'm worried about, it's getting to meet the Northeastern boys before I move down yonder!!!!  8)  8)

Anybody wanna jam??? perhaps some PW blues??

Can one of you hosstraders oldtimers please direct me to some fester info? Directions? etc...

I'm seriously thinking about taking off from work on Friday, and Like Bill IFR is doing, drive up Friday morning, spending Friday night in the van and leave on Saturday..... unless there's some big party happening on Saturday night... good excuse to hang.  :lol:

This will be my first time at Hosstraders, any info would be appreciated.

Thanks!

Glen,
Hosstraders is GREAT....u will NOT be disappointed. The folks are first rate, the food is great....many food venders.......the AM crowd is fantastic.....the setting is perfect.......like a camp ground......the beer is always flowing......well I think u get the picture. If u get there early Friday AM.....get in the sellers line, it will cost u 20 bucks to get in with your car....then once in look for the Swine Barn....the AM'ers will be there. Cant wait to see ya...
Bill

Glenn,

Hosstraders is always a good time.  Bill covered it pretty well.  When you arrive, find the "AM Corral" and you be just fine.  The usual 2 meter FM frequency for AM'ers is 146.445 MHz simplex.  We have a local repeater on 146.895 MHz  (- input and 100.0 pl) which usually sponsors a talk-in.  The Hopkinton Fairgrounds is in the village of Contoocook, NH which is just off  Interstate Route 89 and about 10 miles outside of the capital city of Concord.  It is real easy to find.  This URL is the "official Hosstraders site":

http://www.qsl.net/k1rqg/


(http://www.qsl.net/k1rqg/colorhorse.JPG)

Hope to see you there.

This being my first time to camp out at Hosstraders where can/do the campers park and setup?  As a camper can one get within the sellin' area to setup a campsite even though one is not a seller?

Short answer is yes.  

Long answer:  Since the camping is in the selling area, you may have to pay both the camping fee and the selling fee, $10 each.  Check the Hosstraders site.  I am not sure about both fees..., because I go in Friday, but go home to sleep and return Saturday.  There is lots of room removed from the "selling alleys" for camping.  For the daytrippers, not sellers, the parking is outside the fairgrounds (outside the fence).  The sellers and campers are within the fairgrounds (inside the fence).  

 It's late Friday.  Been a long week.  Dunno know how much sense this makes.  I think I would go with the short answer.        :roll:

Hope to see you there Glenn- probably this would be the first time since you lived down the street in West Nyack and I traded my DX-40 for that 35 MM camera back in high school.

You definitely want to take Friday off and get there early.  Gates open at 0900 I think, but before that everyone lines up in one of the outer parking fields.  

Lots of socializing, food and drink avalable.  I nominate you to bring up some Rockland Bakery bagels and real NY style hard rolls (no one in New England knows how to make em right) for breakfast on Satudray!  Diane usually cooks up a big pot of chili for me to bring up.

If you are camping, plan on paying the admission fee plus sellers fee, comes to I think 30 bucks for early arrivals, 20 after 4 PM Friday.  The place clears out by about 1400 Saturday.

Thanks Jack.
Yeah, all I want to be able to do is pull in with the truck and setup a small camp area for sleeping over. Do some partying and crash out then hit the road the next day.  It doesn't need to be near the selling area but not in the regular parking lot for the day trippers.  All I want to do is setup off the beaten path as it were.

Hey Chris!... It's been a while!!!.... Yep, that was probably around 1973 when we traded DX-40 for camera?... I'm still working on getting the day off, so it's not a definate yet... No problem on the Bagels and rolls except I'll have to buy them Thursday afternoon because I may leave for the fest early Thursday evening, providing they'll let me camp Thursday night..

You know where I'm coming from,, any suggestions for the best route there?

Do they charge more for buyers if you arrive before 4PM? I park out in the field since I stopped selling a few years back, but it might make more sense to pay to go in as a seller. I'm planning to get there by noon or so.

First time I camped was the first time I sold at Deerfield way back when. Slept in the back of a Ford Ranger with a cap. Heavy rain started around 3AM, scared the hell outta me. Sounded like someone was unloading a dumptruck load of marbles on top of that aluminum cap, quite the wakeup call. Still beats the time I slept under someone's truck or motorhome, though.  :roll:

As everyone has said, it's a great time to be had by one and all. You'll never find a more knowedgeable bunch of beer afficionados anywhere. They even know stuff about radio!

~ KAQ

Hi Jack.

Thanks for the info. I'm keeping my fingers crossed about getting Friday off from work, should know by Wed. Looking forward to meeting everyone

Sounds like a lot of fun!  8)  8)  The website says no camping on Thursday night, that means I'll probably have to depart NY about 3am Friday morning!  :oops: which means my butt will be dragging Friday night, but Beer has a funny way of keeping me awake. There's a rumor Brent is bringing a keg of Sam Addams!..

Glen - from Rockland County, take I-287 over the TZ Bridge to I-684 North to I-84 East.   I-84 East to the Mass Pike East to I-495 North.  Near Lowell, take Route 3 North to Concord NH (some tolls).  From 3 North, take I-89 North to Exit 7.  At end of ramp, go right and take your first right (only a few hundred feet  - Warner Road is the road name I think).  Fairground is a few miles down the road on the left. On site, the AMer's 2 meter FM frequency is 146.445 Mhz simplex.

I think the DX-40 / camera swap went down in 1970 because I remember having the camera at URI that fall of my freshman year. I also had the Scott SLRM and Apache at my dorm, but didn't run them much because the transmitter got into everyone's stereos.

Don't forget to eat lots of apple strudel ala mode.

I prefer going up RT91 to Vt. RT9 N. Much nicer ride and no traffic.

I concur.  Route 9 in NH is much better these days, especially with the bypasses around downtown Keene, around Granite Lake in Nelson and around downtown Hillsboro.  Makes it a FB ride! And Route 9 dumps right into Route 89 in Hopkinton.

Yup, you just have to remember to take a left at the light in Keene

Thanks for the directions Chris. Does the Mass pike have a route number? or is it just called the Mass Pike. Don't forget, you're deling with a northern New England newbie.. I basically drive out to the cape every year and that's it... I have this fear of getting lost and ending up in Canada  :roll:  :roll:  

Keeping my fingers crossed, still don't know if I can make it.. but rest assured, if I show up, I will have Rockland County bagels and hard rolls for Saturday Morning.....

Interstate 90

Hope to c u there.

OFFICIAL INR FORCAST



Well we are back to normal Hosstraders weather I think. A shift in the jet stream seems to have turned what would have been a good weekend into a wet one.   Yes I used the r word.

I see rain on Friday and Saturday with Friday being the day with the heavier amounts of rain :(

Sorry but I just predict.

Ah, blue tarp WX.  

Don't forget the blue tarps and wear the GoreTex!

(http://www.strongman.com/blues.gif)

Weather.com and Intellicast show rain, but check out NWS! I think I'll go with that:

Friday...Mostly sunny. Highs around 60.

http://www.srh.noaa.gov/data/forecasts/NHZ008.php?warncounty=NHC013&city=Contoocook

This is my first post on here. I've been listening to 3880 a lot lately. Some of you guys might remember me as the Hosstraders Radio 103.1 guy. I'll be there once again, rain or shine.

73
Jeff - N1ZZN
Hosstraders Radio 103.1 WHTR

How about doing a podcast so us out-of-staters can share the soggy ambience?

I don't know much about "podcasting" but I have thought about just a regular MP3 or WMA stream. Maybe once Verizon extends their wireless broadband up into that area, we'll be able to do it. A couple friends of mine have that service, and it works well as long as your within the coverage area.

I suppose if anyone knows someone that lives within a couple miles of the fairgrounds, they could quite easily set up a windows media stream, by plugging an FM tuner into their sound card.

Maybe I'll try to make some recordings of the action this year. We always try to get on with the wireless mic and broadcast any jam sessions that might happen at night. There has been a problem with the range of the mic though. Anyone have a wireless mic with decent range that I could borrow?

I've seen a WWII walkie talkie tuned to 3885 traveling around Hosstraders...

(http://members.cox.net/n7rk/bc6112.jpg)

Ha, nice! I was looking for something that transmits somewhere in the 161 MC range (or whatever it is) though.

.LONG TERM (SUNDAY THROUGH FRIDAY)...THE COLD FRONT EXITS THE
COAST EARLY IN THE PERIOD ALONG WITH MUCH OF THE SHOWER ACTIVITY.
HOWEVER...FORECAST SOUNDINGS ARE UNSTABLE ON SUNDAY AND I EXPECT
LINGERING INSTABILITY CLOUDS...ALONG WITH A CHANCE OF SHOWERS
THROUGHOUT THE DAY ACROSS THE MOUNTAINS. THEN A SERIES OF WEAK
IMPULSES CROSS THE AREA THROUGH WEDNESDAY AND KEEP THINGS
COOL AND UNSETTLED. HIGH PRESSURE BUILDS EAST ACROSS THE REGION FOR
THURSDAY AND FRIDAY WITH DRY WEATHER AND SLIGHTLY BELOW NORMAL
TEMPERATURES.
&&

If the WX is "ok fine" I hope to be there on Friday although I have been suffering with a bad case of gout from eating to much pink meat!
At least I don't have the gout in my horns!
Sleeping in a Mustang will again be a challenge although if I have enough of Brent's Sam Adams I can get through it.

(http://www.amfone.net/!cid_001f01c1f458$3c4c0940$0200a8c0@attibi.jpg)

Latest NWS forecast for Friday and next Saturday for Hosstraders is partly cloudy, temps in the 60s both days.  Hopefully that wxcast wil stick!

Glenn - K2KL - I actual name of the road you take an immediate right onto after you go right at the end of the 89 Exit 7 north off ramp is Kearsarge Road.  Will take you right down to the fester.

I also agree with GFZ that you might want to take I91 north from I84 in Hartford to Route 9 East in VT/NH - you will avoid tolls and it should be a nice drive w/o traffic early Friday morning.

I hope the forecast I saw was wrong!!

Looks good to me, at least at this point!

Check out for Hopkinton, NH [Concord, NH]

http://www.wunderground.com/cgi-bin/findweather/getForecast?query=hopkinton%2C+nh

T

FORECASH:

 Wednesday
Partly cloudy in the morning...then becoming mostly cloudy. A 50 percent chance of rain showers. Highs around 60.
 
 Wednesday Night
Partly cloudy. Lows in the mid 30s.
 
 Thursday and Thursday Night
Mostly clear. Highs around 60. Lows in the upper 30s.
 
 Friday through Saturday
Partly cloudy. Highs in the lower 60s. Lows around 40.

Hosstraders WX from National Weather Service, Wednesday, May 4th:


Friday. Mostly sunny. Highs around 60. Southeast winds 5 to 10 mph.

Friday night. Partly cloudy. Lows around 40.

Saturday. Mostly cloudy. Highs around 60.

 :D  :D  :D Looking better, gentlemen (and ladies!)...