While travelling I usually stop once or twice a day to check emails from clients and, of course, I choose stopovers with a view. And, in Tasmania that often means an ocean panorama.
Above is the very pretty Pirates Bay lookout near Eaglehawk Neck, and below is a very low tide at the beach at the southern end of Dunalley.
Both turn a potential chore into a pleasure.
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Missing bits for the solar installation, including the four new AGM batteries have finally arrived and been fitted.
The inverter and charger are wired up in the boot, the Morningstar solar charger is installed and showing all is well with the battery bank fully charged.
Only trouble is the existing 12v wiring seems to have decided to do things its own way and when you switch on the pump the kitchen light comes on!
Have left the bus overnight so they can get an early start. As usual, it has taken nearly double the time they initially indicated. Luckily the labour was costed into the quote.
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About eight years ago I was in a minor dispute with the Tax Office and they requested bank statements for the previous five years.
Not a problem I tell the accountant, they’re in a box in the basement storeroom and I’ll send them to you by the end of the month.
It was not to be. A wild storm, a blocked drain, and the storeroom was flooded. By the time I realised what had happened, about three days later, the documents were a solid brick of sodden paper.
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There are interesting times ahead for RV travellers who like to read, and who need to cut down on weight.
Already in the marketplace are the Kindle [from Amazon]. shown right, and Sony’s nice, but expensive, ebook reader.
The Kindle has been a winner for Amazon, and next month they are releasing version II, which should go a long way toward given it a cleaner look. On an ugly scale of 10 I currently give it an 8.
Also due next month, according to the rumour mills, is the Mac Tablet, which could give all competitors a big headache judging by previous launches of new products [think iMac, iPod, iPhone … ] by Apple.
However, another ebook reader has snuck under everybody’s radar — Plastic Logic’s as yet-unnamed electronic reader, shown top, and in use below, which was announced today.
According to the company, their reader supports a full range of business document formats, such as Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint, and Adobe PDFs, as well as newspapers, periodicals and books.
It has an easy gesture-based user interface and powerful software tools that will help business users to organize and manage their information. Users can connect to their information either wired or wirelessly and store thousands of documents on the device.
Watch it in action here:
The reader incorporates E Ink technology for great readability and features low power consumption and long battery life. The Plastic Logic reader is scheduled to ship in the first half of 2009
There’s more information here
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See original story here.
The official fuel consumption results over the 1400 kilometre journey from Biggara Waters on the Gold Coast to Winton Victoria were:
Winnebago Birdsville 23’ (7 metre) motorhome, Fiat Ducato chassis:
11.34ltr/100km
Winnebago Leisure Seeker 23; (7 metre) motorhome, Iveco Daily chassis:
13.52 ltr/100km
Winnebago Longreach 31’ (9.5 metre) motorhome, Isuzu NQR chassis:
16.47 ltr/100km
Winnebago Nullarbor 32’ (10 metre) motorhome, Kodiak chassis:
19.52ltr/100km
Galaxy Caravan 18.6’ caravan towed by a Toyota Landcruiser:
20.52ltr/100km
Travelhome 5th wheeler 25’ 5th wheeler towed by a Nissan Navara:
14.40ltr/100km
Fiat 500 Fiat 500 car:
4.69ltr/100km
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I’ve been working towards official Road Warrior status for some time, but, to be honest, the cost of doing business online was a bit of a worry.
As a web site designer and marketer I need virtually 24/7 access. I have clients in the US, Canada, Hong Kong, mainland Australia and throughout Tasmania.
As an ‘early adopter’ of technology I wasn’t fazed by the ‘how’ but more by the ‘how much?’
It takes me back to the early days when I used to run Desktop magazine from my ‘electronic cottage’ in the wilds of the Tasman Peninsula near Port Arthur.
As Editor I liaised with freelance staff in every capital city, head office in Sydney, and product developers worldwide.
Initially most of of the material was collected by snailmail [and Express Post near deadline], communication was mainly by fax and landline, and emails were just beginning to make inroads — initially via a 2.4Bd modem and gradually creeping up … 9.6Bd …14.4Bd … and a big leap to 56Bd.
They were all painfully slow, and expensive. From my country base it worked out to $12 an hour [thanks Telstra] and sending big image files was simply a no-no.
Then came the move to the city and the gradual embrace of broadband.
When I first started contemplating getting on the road it looked like the only way to go was with a satellite dish — and I was not that impressed with the speed, cost and process of setting it up at each stop.
But, thanks to Moore’s Law [as loosely interpreted by the 'press'] which postulates that computers double in speed every 18 months or so [and roughly halve in cost] I finally have a little electronic dongle — half the size of my mobile phone which allows me to access the Internet from anywhere that I can get 3G reception.
And it works. I get good upload and download speeds; enough to justify the expense and enable me to continue to work on the road.
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Where would we all be without checklists.
At long last I have found the perfect software to simplify the job — and guess what, it works on Macs, PCs and Linux — and is ‘Made in Australia’.
Its called Thinking Rock, and besides being perfect for checklists, it also rocks as a GTD [Getting Things Done] application.
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There’s an interesting experiment underway currently which will impact everyone with a RV who is intimidated with the cost of fuel.
One of Australia’s largest motorhome manufacturers, Winnebago, is conducting an RV Fuel Consumption Run from the Gold Coast to Winton Raceway in Victoria to prove that motorhome travel can be almost as economical as driving an average family car.
Led by the NRMA, who also will supervise fuelling of the test RVs, a convoy of four motorhomes of various sizes, a fifth wheeler and a caravan.
At each town along the way, the convoy is inviting the local people to come along and look at the RVs and meet the team including legendary Australian swimming champion, Dawn Fraser, left, a long-time RV fan.
“Rural Australia stands to suffer the consequences of higher fuel costs because if less people travel, less will be spent in those areas,” said Max Mayo, of Winnebago.
“At any given time 75,000 RVs are on extended travel and spend on average $600 per week each on fuel, accommodation, food and entertainment. That’s $45 million per week given to mainly rural centres. It is this that is at risk. [click to continue…]
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