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I hope our next meeting will prove to be a fun and productive evening delving into the depths of the Acorn RiscPC. The plot is simple, we will start the evening with 2 old RiscPCs, one known working but with ARM6 CPU and very little RAM and a StrongARM RiscPC with RISCOS 4 that has seen better days.
Can we make one good machine from these two? Join us and find out!!
Gareth's photos for the evening were of 2 separate trips, August 2010 to the Isle of Skye in Scotland and October 2009 in New England, USA. Gareth began with the Skye trip and started with images of Loch Lomond on the journey up to Skye. This was the first holiday since buying his Digital SLR, a Pentax K-x.
Driving up from Loch Lomond through Fort William and into the Nevis range, past the Commando Memorial at Spean Bridge and also the Eilean Donan Castle near Kyle of Lochalsh and the Skye Bridge.
The weather was quite wet with low cloud for much of the week's holiday, so visibility particularly at the Old Man of Stor was not too good, making for dramatic moody photos but little chance of seeing the mainland.
On one of the day's Gareth took a boat trip out to Loch Coruisk and was able to get some good close-up photos of seals on the rocks.
During that boat trip it was decided to also do one of the trips out to Rum and Canna on an inflatable rib to see deer on Rum and puffins on Canna. We also saw the Queen's chartered boat the Hebridean Princess off Rum protected by a Frigate escort during her annual summer holiday to the islands.
Moving on Gareth also showed some photos from his New England trip last fall. After landing in Boston Gareth drove down to Plymouth, Massachusetts to see the replica of the Mayflower and of course to see Plymouth rock.
From Plymouth the drive took them down to Cape Cod staying in Hyannis and Brewster and taking a day trip out to Nantucket Island. Driving around Cape Cod you can drive through sleepy little towns such as Chatham and Harwich to name a few.
Moving back inland near to Peterborough, Gareth ventured into the Mt Monadnock area to see the fall colours in all their glory visiting not just Ipswich but also New Ipswich along the way! While in New Hampshire they managed to visit a number of the wooden covered bridges.
Gareth then visited Concord and traced the independence journey to Lexington and Battle Green. He then visited Salem scene of the witch trials and Rockport out on the coast to go whale watching before returning to Boston for a couple of days.
Next up, Frank's slides were of a visit to the USA to see some of the natural wonders of America. Frank began with a map of North America to show us where the sites he visited were. Frank and Anne flew into Denver to start the coach tour, which he would not necessarily recommend due to the travelling with some days being 400 miles on the coach.
Frank's first picture was of the Bronco's Stadium in Denver. The horse on top is Trigger, which was Roy Rodgers' horse. Frank's next pictures were of the state Capitol building of Wyoming, in Cheyenne.
Moving on with the trip Frank and Anne visited the Crazy Horse Memorial in the Black Hills, South Dakota. The chief and his horse are being carved out of the side of the mountain. Next stop also in South Dakota was Mount Rushmore with the Presidents also sculpted out of the mountainside.
Cody in Wyoming was named after William Cody primarily known as Buffalo Bill where Frank visited an Indian museum with lots of ornate dress.
Next up, Yellowstone Park with lots of active thermal vents covering a vast area. Here Frank took lots of pictures of the steaming vents but also the coloured pools caused by bacteria. There are also geysers and Frank took rapid shots of Old Faithful to form a movie of the geyser erupting which happens every 75 minutes approximately.
Frank and Anne then travelled down to Salt Lake City in Utah with lovely views of the mountains from the state Capitol building. Salt Lake City has a large Mormon Temple but also the Mormon Tabernacle where many recordings have been made of the Mormon Choir.
From here they headed south towards the Grand Canyon on the way passing lots of Hoodoos. From the visitors centre the view (over a low knee height wall) of the canyon stretched out 20 miles and down to the bottom of the canyon was 1 mile below.
Peter's first photos were of a trip to Madeira following the disastrous floods in March 2010 showing lots of work in progress to remove mud and rocks that had washed down from the mountains covering the promenades. Peter and Sheila went up a number of mountains and took a number of pictures of the views. On one you could take a toboggan made like a wicker basket down although Peter declined.
Peter also shared with us some wildlife photos taken in various zoos including feeding an elephant at Colchester Zoo and giraffes in West Midlands Safari park.
To round off the evening John brought along some pictures of his local church where he is the church warden. Recently part of the tower had fallen down with the exterior wall coming away from the interior wall and John took a number of photos during the restoration work.
They had also recently had to test the counterweight system for lifting the font cover to prove the old chains and pulleys were safe and John showed us some photographs of the testing in progress with extra weights attached to the system.
John rounded off the evening with photos from a trip to Austria of lake, fishing boats and a gorge with a waterfall at the top together with a hydroelectric lake before ending with the town in which they were staying.
My thanks to everyone who came along to share in our travels and experiences over the last year. As ever we ran out of time and with 2 trips to cram in I did use up more than my slot. I shall volunteer to go last next time!!
Gareth
I'm writing a quick editorial this time as a follow on from the last meeting.
We had a surprise visitor, Andy Keeble, one of the founders of SARC ( Paul Skirrow being the other), who had managed to track us down after several years out odf Ipswich. We were very pleased to see Andy again and hope he will be able to come and join the club again.
Peter
| 2010 | ||
| 24th November (4th Wednesday!) |
"How to rebuild a RISCOS machine." -making one machine from parts of two Risc PCs. |
Frank, Gareth and Peter |
| 15 December | Gadgets and Party evening | All |
| 2011 | ||
| 19 January | Social Evening - Venue TBA | All |
| 16 February | Gigabit Networking , USB2 & 3 | All |
| 16 March | Linux update | Gareth |
| 20 April | AGM plus Games | All |
Meetings are now on the Third Wednesday of the month unless otherwise stated.
Our meetings are held at the Bourne Vale Social Club, Halifax Road, Ipswich IP2 8RE , for a map and other details please see the website. http://icenicomputerclub.users.btopenworld.com
The first visit is free and subsequent visits for non - members is £2·50. The membership fee is £20 due from the AGM date in April, but may be reduced for those joining late in the year.
Continuing our publicity for EAUG events, there is now a full list of meetings up to the end of the year on their website.
http://www.eaug.org.uk/mtg.htm
Tea/coffee/biscuits usually available.
Visitors pay 2.00 GBP for the evening, which is deductible from the normal joining subscription if you decide to join at a later date.
See the Membership page of the website for more information:
http://www.eaug.org.uk/mem.htm
Meetings are at the Great Baddow Village Hall, on the second Tuesday of the month
opening at 7:30 p.m. for a start at 7:45 - 8:00 p.m.
For directions see below (note the new web addresses)
http://www.eaug.org.uk or 'phone one of the contacts on http://www.eaug.org.uk/ppl.htm
They have now moved to the St. Andrew's Computer Club at Britannia Road, Ipswich. They have picked up a couple of people from the Church and are seeking to include people from the Parish.
There's not much about the Computer Club on the website (http://www.ourstandrews.co.uk), but there are a few words. (Ken Tew)
"ICENI does not have any Insurance cover for computers or other equipment so please be advised that you bring machines to the club at your own risk."
However many household insurance policies will include cover away from home often with no increase in premium. (Ed.)
If anyone would like a copy of the CD of our old newsletters this could be arranged.
I am open to suggestions on what people would like to have included in the website.
Our website URL is
http://icenicomputerclub.users.btopenworld.com as a virtual domain,
it can also be reached using http://www.btinternet.com/~icenicomputerclub
Email to: iceni@woolridge.org.uk