San Antonio Hams

Call for Volunteers!

On January 18, 2015, Sunday of the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend,  Carroll is kicking it up a notch with the Buena Suerte 50 Mile / Quick Silver 30 K Ultra Run in the Big Bend Ranch State Park. Some of the single tracks, creek beds, and unmaintained sections of the course in the Big Bend Ranch make the Course Roads of the National Park look like super highways for the runners.

If you enjoy the desert and Big Bend area of West Texas. If you enjoy the  challenge of camping out in the wilderness in winter time. If you can afford several days of vacation in January. Maybe you would like to visit the  historic and naturally scenic Big Bend Ranch State Park.  Located between Lajitas and Presidio where Ranching and Mining were once the  driving forces of economy in the area. The Big Bend Ranch State Park is a wonderfully preserved area of the Big Bend Border Land covering over 300,000 acres.

For 6 of the last 9 years, Carroll Voss kf5kqa, of Overland Race Management, has organized and directed Ultra Run foot race events in Big Bend National Park. It has been very popular with the runners and an enjoyable outing for the support volunteers. The Big Bend Amateur Radio Club has organized the communications for the event and the San Antonio Area HAMs have assisted  with a good number of HAM volunteers.

We are going to need HAM volunteers for the run in Big Bend Ranch State  Park, but most of the stations will need volunteers with short wheelbase,  high clearance 4-wheel drive vehicles and hardy individuals who would like to do some primitive camping out for a couple of days in some of the most remote wilderness of the Chihuahua Desert.

There will be a need for a number of HAMs at the Sauceda Ranch Headquarters in the Park which can be reached with 2-wheel drive with a reasonable ground clearance, but not accessible to RVs. And there will be a need for a few extra hands at the Barton Warnock Center in Lajitas where the Start/Finish, Net Control, and Race Headquarters will be located. It is located right off FM-170, the highway between Big Bend National Park and Presidio, and requires no special vehicles. There is the Maverick RV Park in Lajitas.

Anyone interested in volunteering for this event is encouraged, First of  All, to visit the bigbend50.com web site for more information on the race.  Be sure to visit the section for “Radio Operators.” In that section I have posted a kmz file for Google Earth users that should be helpful. Also visit the Big Bend Ranch State Park web site at https://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/state-parks/big-bend-ranch for details about the Park, camping rules and reservations, road conditions, etc.

Then if interested in volunteering contact;
San Antonio – Central Texas: Charles Land KC5NKK, charlesdland@gmail.com
cell phone 512 796-7565
Big Bend and West Texas: Bill Baker W5ATO, w5ato@arrl.net

For more info;
http://www.bigbend50.com/
https://www.tpwd.state.tx.us/state-parks/big-bend-ranch
http://www.bigbendarc.com/
http://www.sanantoniohams.org/
http://www.overlandracing.com/

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Bill Baker,W5ATO
Alpine, Texas
w5ato.bill@verizon.net