We Made It!
We’ll we made it! We’re at our first stop - Twin Mountain, NH.
The park is nice. The kids just left to go to an ice cream social at the main building.
Had some trouble with the WiFi. My special antenna rig isn’t working. I think it might be the ethernet bridge - which, for the uninitiated, takes the WiFi signal and sends it to a wireless router we have in the RV. This not only amplifies a weak WiFi signal, but it also allows us to all share one connection.
Amplifying the signal is expecially important at KOA campgrounds. KOA uses Hotspotzz as their WiFi provider. Every Hotspotzz installation I’ve ever seen at a KOA uses just one antenna - mounted on top of the office. Such an arrangement means that you either need some sort of system to boost the receiption, or you need a site close to the office. Fortunately, we’re close to the office here.
The bridge that I think has gone bad is a year old, and the manufacturer has since discontinued that model. They have a newer, smaller one now that is $100 cheaper than what I paid. I’ll have to try and locate one at some point on the trip.
On the way out here we took Route 2, which is pretty much the road from Bangor to the White Mountains of New Hampshire. (It actually goes all the way to Burlington, VT.) Route 2 winds through lots of one-horse towns and forests.
I flipped on MacStumbler - software that looks for WiFi signals - and detected 59 access points. Most of them had no security turned on.