For better or for worse, when I travel / camp, I'm never away from my work. Of course the good part of that is that I can travel pretty much whenever and wherever I like. The converse is that I'm pretty much always working - at least for some part of the day. But I'm fortunate in that I love what I do, and as long as I have a decent internet connection, I'm able to accomplish most of what I need to get done. And that's where this post begins... getting and staying connected in less than optimum conditions.
I've stayed in plenty of great campgrounds that offer well managed and speedy WiFi service - often for free. And I've stayed in places that don't offer WiFi, which is why I carry both AT&T and Sprint wireless broadband cards with me. During all my travels last year, I was able to connect using one of the setups.
This week's trip is a 10 day stay at a beautiful, well managed campground New River Junction in SW VA. Our site is directly on the New River, and we've taken advantage of tubing and canoing the river during our stay. The campground advertises free WiFi, and even has a directional antenna with a decent booster attached. I was expecting good things and easy connectivity during the week.
After setting up and getting comfortable, I decided to check my email. I was able to connect to the camp's network using the access code provided at the office, and my email began to appear - slowly. No problem; I'm connected and getting what I needed for the time being.
The next day, connectivity was a different story. I was able to connect to the network, but could not get to any web sites. The camp office doesn't open till 11:00 am, but unconcerned, I switched on my camper's own router using my AT&T card. After waiting a few minutes, I was able to connect to the network, but it seemed that AT&T service was unavailable in this large, remote valley. On to the next option...
I inserted my iPass card (Sprint service) and fired up a connection. Happily, I was able to get a slow, but usable connection, even though the connection reported itself as Roaming. I guessed that I should conclude my business and terminate the roaming connection ASAP, which I did.
I should say here that I was probably able to get the Sprint connection, only because I have a decent cellular booster that uses a trucker's antenna mounted atop the camper. Still, it was not a happy situation.
When the campground office opened, I asked about the connection, and found that the local cable company doesn't support this area, DSL service has just recently been announced here, but is not installed yet, and the current connection is a satellite connection through DirectWay. I've used satellite connections before, and they have been passable, but using one as a campground's main connection is fraught with issues, and one of them was showing itself.
Satellite providers have pretty restrictive 'fair use' policies that limit how much bandwidth can be consumed at any given time, and for how many megabytes of download. In a campground, it's likely that any number of campers might decide to
a) download some music
b) listen to internet radio
c) play a Netflix video
d) watch a Hulu tv episode
e) browse Youtube videos
f) have a video chat over Skype
g) ... well you get the idea
It seems this happens regularly here and has been a source of consistent outages, as DirectWay simply shuts off the service when it determines its bandwidth limits have been exceeded. In fact, it shuts down the service for 24 hours. The campground owner explained that he's contacted DirectWay about this, but they won't budge in restoring service ahead of time. His only recourse is to pay for more bandwidth, but I expect there is no capacity that is likely to be 'enough' for this situation.
So what was my solution? I waited for the campground to clear out on Monday when service was restored, and even then I decided that a trip to Barnes & Noble for coffee and free (fast) WiFi was the thing to do. I was able to get the majority of my work done in a couple of hours, then return to the campground and spend most of the rest of the day sitting in my chair - in the river.
After all, there's got to be at least some time for non-tech camping, right?
