Gold Country Fondo

First post to the ham radio blog. Not that I will actually continue to update this, but I figured I'd at least capture a few thoughts as I have them.

I volunteered this weekend as a ham operator at the Gold Country Fondo bike ride in northern California.

Before the ride I made sure to program the primary and secondary repeaters into my radio via the programming software and cable. I also added the local fire, sheriff, and NOAA channels.

I also ordered an additional battery for my radio. I charged up all batteries and prepared my gear for the morning.

Summary of gear:

• FT60R
• FT60R chargers (car, rapid)
• Folding chair
• water
• subway sandwich
• rain gear
• warm clothes
• leatherman
• Ear piece mic
• Frequency/call sign list
• radio user guide

I was stationed at rest stop # 4 on Rock Creek road. We arrived around 10:30 for an 11-5 PM shift.  The station was being setup by some volunteers. They were setting up tents and preparing food. I arrived an introduced myself. The volunteers were surprised at the small size of my FT-60R radio.

I checked in via the repeater with my handset and had pretty good signal for sending and receiving.

There were ~5 hams working total:

• ham at start/end
• ham in SAG wagon
• ham on a bike pariticapting
• another SAG ham
• myself at rest station

Through out the day I handled traffic on:

• Changing route - it was raining cats and dogs. There were multiple routes. The longest route was deemed unsafe and the riders switched to the medium route. I relayed that message and we stopped several riders for taking the closed path.
• Car Accident - There was a car accident between two of the rest stops. There was a request for us to relay to riders that the accident may have debris in the road. 
• Rider Location - We were asked to look out for a specific rider who had past medical issues.
• Ride updates - General updates on the number of riders coming through, the last riders.
• Checking out - closing down the rest area and checking out with the net control. 

Things I noticed:

• Ear piece is key - at the rest stop it got pretty loud including music being played. At first I used the radio without the ear piece but once the volume kicked up I had to switch to the earpiece
• Gratitude - I must have been thanked by 3-4 people volunteering as well multiple times. There was a genuine sense of gratitude expressed by others for the hams being out there and helping keep the communication flowing. Quite honestly it made me proud to be there.
• Mic fright gone - part of the reason I volunteered was to help get over my mic fright. Once I checked in and communication was flowing that fright was gone.
• Repeater usage - We had permission from the repeater owners to use the repeater that day. We still had random users on the repeater, but it didn't seem to affect us at all.   
• Chest rig - I didn't have a chest rig to hold my radio but I sure could have. I needed constant access to the radio and with the rain gear it was difficult I have since ordered one.

Over all I had a great time. I look forward to volunteering again.