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BCN Challenge 2014 - 24 & 25th May


junior

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Hi all,

 

Just to let you know that Crane is entered for the Challenge. Crew is still being sorted but we should be leaving for Brum on Tuesday.

 

Route planning and general logistics seem to be taking up quite a lot of time!

 

But looking forward to the event and to meeting you.

 

Geoff

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Welcome to the forum Geoff, and good luck in the challenge

 

CWDF BCN Challenge entries 2014

Team Tawny Owl - RLWP, Mrs Tawny Owl, Smudge, Purple Fairie, Proper Job, Richard Parry, Statto Dave, Swimmin' Rob Jacob

Iona - MILLIE!, Ange, Davel, Divum Draconis

The Cat Who Walks By Himself - Nine of Hearts, Sis and Bro in law*

Cobbett - Wrigglefingers, Starcoaster, Katie, Ellen, Feral Mattress*

Diesel and Dust - Tom and Bex

Firefly - John6767

Team Red Wharf - Victor Vectis, Little Else, Madcat

Albion - Junior, Rob-M, Captain Fizz (CEO), Matty40s(ships cat)

MVCL - System 4-50

Clarrie - LaurieB *

Peckham Poppy - AMY, Odana, Black Beauty, Keeping Up, Father-Bill-from-Auckland

Telemachus - nicknorman, Jeff, Chris

The Moorhen - Mike & Jane

Clover - sarahavfc, M589

Beau - Dave_P, 'Pound-drainer' Louise, Tall Blair, Tea-girl Lou

Reginald - Mike the Boilerman, Tree Monkey

Stronghold - Oakie, Barry Adams and "Mouse"

Chalice - Non-puking ODIN, Alan, Cath & David Fincher

Carpe Vinum - Kustomcut

Indigo Dream - Assorted greyhounds, RichardN, Greygal, The Synth Prof, Famous Knees Christine, Sue

Golden Boyz - Golden Boyz (Sandra, Sally & Alan)

Denry - Bella Basset, Paul C, little duck!

NB Ryeland - Richard, Anne and Stephen Lacey

Crane - Geoff Bailey

#bcnchallenge

So, anyone up for being the CWDF commentator, a gongoozling Murray Walker?
Richard
*Wooden spoon class competitors - a strong field with Clarrie's proven record and The Cat a famous player. However Team Cobbett's qualifying runs over the weekend indicate that they must be favourites this year
Edited by RLWP
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42 entries now I hear!! You are bound to see someone on your travels. Getting through Gosty Tunnel on the run home will be interesting!! See you there!!:help:

Blimey. If the majority of people are choosing to start from one of the designated starting places I can see them all being busy on friday night too!

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Iona has crept a little closer to her starting point and is outside the Anchor at High Offley after a very convivial mini banter with Richard and Sue (skippers of Team Tawny Owl) at the Navi in Gnosall.

 

Wheaton Aston is our aim tomorrow. You can only take mini leaps when someone (Dave) has to walk back to fetch the car.

 

Sorry Starry I'm going for it first - 7 sleeps to go! (I had to count that out on my fingers three times before I (hopefully) got it right! You can blame the Newcastle Brown in the Navi, the beer in the Anchor and the wine on board Iona :D)

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Team Cobbett reporting in, we have had a dummy-run prop dive to warm up...

 

 

IMG-20140517-00649_zps6b429870.jpg

 

I seriously think you are underestimating Munk and MB if you don't see them in the running for the wooden spoon too...

BTW, I got UP by midday thanks! :D

Cobbett passed me yesterday ..... I see you're dredging as you go!

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Another newbie (to BCN challenge) query, do i take it that people chose to keep their starting positions a closely gaurded secret and then once underway keep posted as to progress/whereabouts!? We havent got a twitter account but will have (hopefully) internet connection.

I notice as yet, no one has specifically mentioned starting positions unless, not understanding area i have missed this!

Edited by little duck!
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Another newbie (to BCN challenge) query, do i take it that people chose to keep their starting positions a closely gaurded secret and then once underway keep posted as to progress/whereabouts!? We havent got a twitter account but will have (hopefully) internet connection.

I notice as yet, no one has specifically mentioned starting positions unless, not understanding area i have missed this!

You will find that people don't divulge their starting location generally, but come 8:00AM Saturday, it is all out in the open.

 

If you get a twitter account (its free and there is no real reason not to; you don't have to use it other than for the event) and follow us, or the #bcnchallence hash tag then you will certainly know where we are, and I expect others too! We will try an post to this thread a bit too, but it is much simpler to post pictures to twitter whilst on the move and on a phone. Hopefully use of twitter gets more exposure to the event as well.

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Another newbie (to BCN challenge) query, do i take it that people chose to keep their starting positions a closely gaurded secret and then once underway keep posted as to progress/whereabouts!? We havent got a twitter account but will have (hopefully) internet connection.

I notice as yet, no one has specifically mentioned starting positions unless, not understanding area i have missed this!

 

What! You don't believe we are starting in Venice? I'm deeply wounded...

 

It's all part of the 'fun'

 

We will Twitter (when I remember), and I'm going to dig out stuff about active mapping

 

Richard

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Right, route tracking. I'm thinking that the Map my Walk app is the way to go. It will record the route, and it can be shared through social media. I'm not sure if you can put multiple 'walks' onto a single map to show more than one boat

 

What else is there? It needs to be able to take data from Android and Iphone (and manually?) and share to the world

 

Richard

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There's Water Explorer http://www.waterexplorer.co.uk/gmaps/InteractiveCanalMap.aspx which does real time boat tracking, so one could easily zoom in on Birmingham and see who is where?

I did to try that one, but I did not have a lot of luck with it, and it needs a laptop with gps, which I do have, but not everyone is going to have. Does it plot a course as well as a spot location?

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Right, route tracking. I'm thinking that the Map my Walk app is the way to go. It will record the route, and it can be shared through social media. I'm not sure if you can put multiple 'walks' onto a single map to show more than one boat

 

What else is there? It needs to be able to take data from Android and Iphone (and manually?) and share to the world

 

Richard

I was going to look at Map my Walk but the speed Team Albion will be travelling at we will probably need Map my Run...!
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I thought it allowed manual updates of position? Oh well never mind. Anyway, we will have a laptop and (signal depending, though it should be okay) internet connection and were going to start a thread of its own on the day and update it with some pics etc. Maybe a separate thread with pics and 'commentary' from the day as it goes, would be okay, rather than 51 pages in on here?

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It's tricky, we need to be able to accommodate the extreme velocity of Team Albion, and the prolonged stationary times of Team Cobbett

 

Can Map my Walk show multiple walkers?

 

Richard


I thought it allowed manual updates of position? Oh well never mind. Anyway, we will have a laptop and (signal depending, though it should be okay) internet connection and were going to start a thread of its own on the day and update it with some pics etc. Maybe a separate thread with pics and 'commentary' from the day as it goes, would be okay, rather than 51 pages in on here?

 

Perhaps launch a new thread on the Saturday, cross linked with this one?

 

Now, if we had an 'official' reporter, they could do it.

 

Richard

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Water Explorer certainly shows multiple boats but I don't think there's a way of differentiating a particular sub-group so it will show all boats who are registered on it (if they have set their permissions to "visible") whether they are in the BCN or not. I think it will only work for people who have a Windows laptop and GPS; I don't think there are versions of it for Android or Apple.

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I did to try that one, but I did not have a lot of luck with it, and it needs a laptop with gps, which I do have, but not everyone is going to have. Does it plot a course as well as a spot location?

Apparently it can be used just with a GPS enabled smart phone, and a computer isn't a requirement.

 

That said, I'm not the best person to ask how to do that, as we are using a computer!

 

I think "Tiller Girl" posted some useful info on using Water Explorer with just a GPS enabled phone.

That seems to give instantaneous positions boat by boat. It doesn't show more than one boat at a time, or seem to show the route traversed

 

Richard

 

Using a computer connected to a GPS dongle, the information about boat locations on the Water Explorer website is as good as the last time the computer sent updates to the website.

 

When we have a good internet signal that can be about every 10 minutes, but in a no signal area, then of course no updates, and the boat apperas to be stopped wherever it last sent a good update.

 

[EDIT: Correction: Currently Navvygator seems to be updating our position every 3 minutes. I'm not sure if that is configurable?]

 

Currently we are approaching Bugbrooke, and it seems to be more or less right for "Chalice" at the moment.

 

Linky.

Edited by alan_fincher
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You will find that people don't divulge their starting location generally, but come 8:00AM Saturday, it is all out in the open.

 

If you get a twitter account (its free and there is no real reason not to; you don't have to use it other than for the event) and follow us, or the #bcnchallence hash tag then you will certainly know where we are, and I expect others too! We will try an post to this thread a bit too, but it is much simpler to post pictures to twitter whilst on the move and on a phone. Hopefully use of twitter gets more exposure to the event as well.

 

I have Twitter but don't really use it but will attempt to on the day. How do I follow #bcnchallenge? Can I follow it now or do I need to wait until the day?

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I expect that there will be a few people trial running the Twitter feed. Like me - I need to find a Twitter app for Android that doesn't drive me insane

 

Richard

Edited by RLWP
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