Another Good Day at Dayton

Another good day at Dayton. The crowds this year are way down, and the weather is perfect, making for a very laid-back, pleasurable experience. I've completed the acquisition of my entire shopping list, spending about 15% less than I budgeted. Best of all, I got all but one of the things that Debbie wanted, and I got one more thing that she added to her list once I called her and told her the fantastic prices I found here. I only purchased three items that weren't on my list (which is actually very HARD to do at a place like this!). But to be fair, one of those three really should have been on my list to start with, if I'd been able to remember it before I got here. So overall, this has been an excellent trip.

Here is a photo of the main arena, which normally holds about 5,000 people for a basketball or hockey game. this is just ONE (1) of six huge buildings containing the vendors. Four of the buildings are exhibition halls much bigger than this arena. In addition, there are about 30 acres of parking lot covered with ham-radio flea-market vendors, hundreds, maybe thousands, of them. Look up "Hara Arena" on Wikipedia. (Click on the pictures below for a larger version.)



Here is a picture showing some of the antenna samples being shown. You really have to click on this one to appreciate all the antennas in this one aisle of this one single room.


Here's my friend Brian with the roaming astronaut. There's all kinds of things to see at Dayton.


Here is the Hammock-mobile, my cousin's RV, from Minnesota. I had a very nice hour chatting with him. He has three grandchildren, even though he is younger than me!


We call this car "the porcupine". Click on the pic and take a close look at the larger version and you'll see why. Dubby should be glad our cars don't look like this. And yes, the owner is still married to his first wife. Of course, she's also a ham...