Early birds
 

Anyone else going down from Edinburgh way on Wednesday..?

We're heading down the A68 in the morning, stopping at the Camion cafe for breakfast. We'll be on the trusty Transalp, say hello if you spot us. :thumbup1:

We are coming from Dumfries
 

Hi we will be heading over to Scotch corner so my well see you, my wife and i are on a GS and a Rockster 1150
Doug Sanders :welcome:

This year so far has been a bloody struggle in more ways than one, now for all you people that are going to make next weekend very special I thank you all in advance and to be honest can't bloody wait to get there and have a relaxing beer and a chat....

Anyone heading up from Dorset?

Absolutely - the bike and helping out! Always happy for helpers - makes the Meet run smoothly:thumbup1: Hunt me out when you are set up.
Cheers for now,
Sam

Presentations
 

Having a central store of presentations is certainly achievable from a techie point of view (we could create a slideshare library of them for instance), BUT...

...while many of the presenters may be more than willing to publish their material (I'm one of them) - and/or do the copying to memory stick thing - some will understandably prefer not to because they're professional speakers and earn some of their living from doing talks (not that anyone gets paid for presenting at Ripley I hasten to add).

Grant or Sam may have other views on this, but my suggestion would be to go with the idea of asking each presenter at the END of a talk if you can get a copy. If the (partial) central library happens as well at some point then so much the better.

One request from me though.... there's very little time between talks (people need to move rooms, go to the bar/loo, the next presenter needs to get set up, etc.), so please don't hang around waiting to grab a copy. Arrange to meet at the bar, in the marquee, or in the 'Amazonia' room to swap email addresses. The 'Amazonia' room is probably the best place if lots of people are interested. Will make life easier for everyone - thanks. :)

Carnet Advice from the RAC
 

Some 'breaking news'...

Paul Gowan - "Mr. Carnet" - from the RAC has just confirmed that he'll be at Ripley from Friday afternoon onwards.

He'll be available to talk to anyone who'd like some one-to-one, straight from the horse's mouth, no-nonsense info and advice about all things Carnet du Passage.

This won't appear on the main schedule - so look out for more info about times and locations at Registration and on the main noticeboard.

Excellent news. Lovely chap. He is also Mr IDP ... "International Driving Permit" and Mr ICMV "International Certificate for Motor Vehicles"

I apreciate that not all presentations will lend themselves to being copied, as I suspect the more popular entertaining ones wouldn`t make sense even if you did copy the file(s). Which is why I`m focusing on the more technical presentations.
I`m aware that time is short between the presentations, with change overs etc. But judging by the what I remember from last year, several presenters where quite happy to make it known at the beginning of each presentation, that anyone wish to ask more detailed questions, they would be happy to meet people in the bar etc afterwards, so as to not cause any disruption at the change over. A few free beers from the odd members of an apreciative audience are always an incentive.
I`m not sure if hosting a central database or liberary would work, however the simplicity of hosting it, theres still webspace to be paid for on the server, and some of the files could be quite huge

Danny & Fil's Road-kill cookout
 

May I encourage anyone who's coming along to go and see the Road-kill cook out on Saturday at 3pm.

http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2501/...0d0cac1c_b.jpg

It's possible you could argue this is revenge for the 'oil' incident. :innocent: But I wouldn't know what you were talking about.

I will be there too, I have not put my HU or ABR Stickers on my new bike.

Bugger off :-)

It clashes with the the Two Pegs to Patagonia preso ! :-)

That's Why....
 

...it's so quiet on the HUBB. You're all at Ripley, I hope you're having a great time, sorry to be missing it, my favourite event of the yearbier

I'm sat in a very tense Lhasa- chinese troops in riot gear are everywhere, there's a Communist Anniversary coming up, and they're expecting trouble.

Haven't had internet contact for a while as the Tibetan Plateau doesn't have electricity let alone other niceties- even the sleeping accommodation is so basic it was shared as I found out when four Chinese Truckers crawled in next to me in the middle of the night:confused1:

They didn't realise I was female until the next morning.

Enjoy Ripley and I hope to see some of you at the September Meet:funmeteryes:

Photos?
 

I had a great weekend but as usual didn't get many photos - is there going to be any sort of photo repository on the HUBB for people to upload good shots they've taken or similar, a bit like a mass ride report sort of thing??

Well done to Grant, Susan and all the other people involved in making it what it was, I'm already looking forward to next year but also very inspired to be on some remote gravel road at the same time!!

It was my first time and I hope this is the correct place to say what a great four days.
Such great organisation, very friendly folk and great talks.
Brilliant.

Absolutely the right place - and we're delighted to hear you had a great time! the volunteers and presenters are what made it all happen, so we're very appreciative of their efforts - they were brilliant! :thumbup1:

See you there next year - the only excuse for not being there is that you're on the road! And then we expect a presentation on your return ;)