[IRCA] Caribbean trip part 1 of 2

["Bob Foxworth" <rfoxwor1@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Caribbean Boat Trip Report  - Bob Foxworth

A few weeks ago Pat told me she located a decent
price on a 7-day Eastern Caribbean trip on what
arguably can really be called a ship. A huge,
hulking ship that travels 22 MPH, is loaded with
restaurants, (you only get to use one at a time,
though) and is actually a rather quiet MW RF
environment, not to mention visiting interesting
places with unusual radio stations. I said, "sign
us up".

We left Miami on Saturday the 14th, the same day
that the cold wave blew in, and literally followed
us for the next couple days eastward. We drove
down from Tampa to Miami, a 4 hour trip in chilly
30 mi/hr gusts. I'd think the poor people just
arriving home that day were mildly (!) surprised,
probably having nothing warmer than a suit jacket,
packed away in a giant suitcase. At least we had a
chance to plan for this, bringing jackets that we
needed. Fla. winter wx is always a gamble.

On plotting our expected course, I was dreaming of
being in near-visual range of exotic low powered
Cubans. On leaving. I soon found out that there
are actually a couple ways this trip could proceed.
Our voyage (on the Carnival Triumph) was sked to
visit San Juan, St. Thomas and St. Maarten on three
consecutive days, then return. The logical course
would seem to skim the north coast of Cuba and
Hispaniola, however there is a different route in
which we depart Miami and head roughly east (about
85 deg.) and thread through the Bahamas, coming
out between Abaco and Eleuthera (in the N.E.
Providence Channel). Then, passing north of San
Salvador, Mayaguana, and Turks and Caicos and
straight into San Juan. The return trip was nearly
identical. This is a busy ship channel but it
obviously keeps us several hundred miles away from
Cuba so only the stronger stations are heard by
day. Nonetheless the sea-water path provides many
interesting targets for daytime listening. At
night many domestic channels have nasty hets and
there are not a lot of clear signals to work with.

This effect seems to be governed partly by the
direction being faced. We had a cabin with window
on deck 2 (ranging from zero to 11) port side
aft but near the middle. Around 1745 local time
outbound we were facing north and I was hearing
all the big NE USA stations, out to KDKA, WTAM,
WHAS, Michigan on 1220 etc with good signals. One
of the best was WINS 1010 which I have never
once heard from Tampa, but here in east Bahamas
they were s-9 and very clear on the second night.

By contrast on the return trip, everything heard
was from LA/SA, on the 19th and 20th and I think
the shielding of the ship behind me was what
governed this. This could be good guidance for
the ambitious DXer wanting to build a large
shielded device for land use to get directional
rear shielding.

All my night listening was from the cabin window,
to avoid curious stares, but daytime was no
problem and only 1 person asked about my GPS.
Use of radios with headphones (only) is OK when
outside on the decks (to avoid noise complaints
from others who want quiet).

I tried listening from the outside deck aft but
the buffeting of the wind and the noise of the
diesels makes it rather challenging, even with
a headset, and using a "non-typical" radio always
gets unwanted attention. I used my dx398 which
is enough to deal with. There was almost zero
electrical noise and only when forward I could
hear the tiniest "thwip" from the Atlas radars
on MW. I concentrated almost all of my efforts
on MW. However there must have been FM tropo
on the 15th at 1555 EST northeast of Mayaguana
(23 deg 16 N, 72 deg 27 W) FM was full of rock
EE as well as SS and I IDed (via RDS) "102-Jamz"
on 101.9 with 407-area code ADs, and "amor 107"
on 107.5 (unID) out of a total of about 20 good
FM signals.

Florida AMers were clear out this far, as well,
and WJNA-640, and 850, 940 and 1080 from the
Miami area were well heard. I heard a single
Reloj-950 signal, at the time the ship heading
was 120 degrees and I was getting a null on the
rcvr of 125 degrees relative to the ships course,
this points to the Camaguey/Holguin area as a
probable source of the other 950 Reloj but there
are just too many uncertainties at that distance.

There seems to be no Habana signals that far east,
due likely to the bulge of north coastal Matanzas
shielding out to about 80 deg., just as when in
Tampa, we can't hear east of Habana by day due
to land near Sarasota.

On the way down I asked* casually if we would be
taking the "other" route back (clearly marked
on big charts in lobby walls) and the reaction
is like "why do you ask" It seems that today's
traveller is concerned solely with "when we
get there" and (except for me) not at all with
"how we get there", and once you mention going
near Cuba then the eyebrows really start
wiggling.

*The purser's office is good at knowing the casino
hours. As for the route, well...

Ironically that same ship's very next trip was a
Western Caribbean run, out of Miami, and making
Ocho Rios, Cayman, then Cozumel. This is the one
that the student of Cuban radio wants to take,
as you literally circle the island at close range.
At this range your handheld TV will work, and you
too can see films of Fidel touring decrepit old
farms, as I did a few years ago on a Cozumel trip
that skirted Pinar.

If you make this run, take a handheld GPS to
track position and heading, as I did. Take some
navigation maps and a 360-degree plastic compass
rose to get rough bearings (if feasible). You
can get the ship heading from GPS and then turn
the receiver to align with the deck planking
and add the values. However at our far range, DF
values I got are just rough approximations.

If your interest is in recording IDs, you should
definitely consider having several small rcvrs,
each with a patch cord and small recorder. You
can pre-build Y-cables that let you record the
headphone jack output and bridge a headset on
the feed. Target several good signals, and record
across the hour on each one. ID times vary and
you can waste a TOH ID opportunity by being on
the "wrong" frequency. Since you're listening to
"locals" the receiver quality can be just
ordinary. You'll want to spend the $ to get a
cabin with a window, of course. Our ship's
windows were about 4 foot square with a nice
ledge for holding gear. Upper decks have
balconies, at some added cost. Put your gear
away when the cleaning crew comes. Not a theft
issue, but you don't want to risk drawing any
attention from inquisitive cabin stewards who
think you're sending messages back to the
Mother Ship, or to el Barbudo for that matter.

On such a trip there's lots to do, and the time
available for playing radio is less than you'd
expect, and in that time frame generally just a
few decent IDs can be had. And while in port,
we enjoyed the port. We had just 5 hours in SJU
(evening, time for a walking tour of the old
city and a couple of mojito's.) The other ports
were 11 or 12 hour stops, and naturally when in
SXM we headed straight to Orient Beach for a few
hours. There are $60 taxis available but we
took the 10-passenger van that cost $5/person
for this half-hour trip. Gasoline costs over
4 dollars/gal but is sold by the liter (1.95
NA guilder/liter; a ANG guilder = 56 cents)(The
Euro is used on the French side). Everyone
takes US dollars though.

One (my) suggestion: don't bring back ANY tobacco
products. Your 5 liters of V.I. liquor is not
a problem. They are watching for Cuban cigars.

In part 2 I'll detail some of the particular
loggings I made.



sent 1429 est




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