Camera Mounts

I´ve been looking at camera mounts today.

The three-suction one is from Dogcam and costs £23.99.

The single suction is made by Cullman and costs £28.

The three-suction one appeals - not just because it is cheaper, but I like the idea of having three areas to rely on. It will only need to hold 107 g (3.8 oz) plus the weight of two AA batteries, - the weight of the Kodak Zi6

From the Dogcam website...
Compact alloy triple suction mount with adjustable head
A compact triple suction mount with alloy base. For use with bullet cameras and very small dsc's or camcorders. Provides excellent adjustment and a very strong suction grip. These mounts have been designed in house and it's one of the mounts we use most often for filming on bikes or cars.

If you have any experience using a camera mount on a motorcycle or have alternative suggestions, please leave a comment

Data Storage On The Road

The ASUS Eee 901 only has 12 gb of storage, so we need an external hard drive. With a 10mpx camera and lots of video at 60 fpm, plenty of storage is needed. Again, it has to be rugged - can you imagine losing all those precious photos and video of your trip; the idea makes me shudder.

Freecom make a really tough, small external portable drive:

Features :

• Durable, shock resistant hard drive, ideal for mobile computing
• Outdoor active sports design, including integrated USB cable with unique climbing rope texture
• Internal anti-shock mechanism insulating the hard drive from shock
• Can withstand falling from 2 metres on a fl at surface
• Secure encrypted 256 bit MD5 hardware password protection
• Turbo USB 2.0 driver, for faster data transfer speeds (Windows only)
• Integrated USB cable, no additional connection cables needed!
• The easiest way to add additional storage space to your computer
• Fast and easy “plug and play” installation, no need to restart your computer
• High quality design, only 155 x 91 x 21mm in size
• No cooling fan, no noise!
• Including extensive backup software
• USB 2.0: available as 250, 320 and 500GB
• All Freecom devices meet the highest industry standards
• 2 years manufacturers warranty and unlimited help desk support

Designed for:

• Data storage; use all your data, like business information, digital photos, videos, MP3s and withstand bouncing around in handbags, cars etc.
• File sharing; share all your important data between computers and networks
• Backup; protect all your data against calamity, human errors and virusses
• Archiving; archive all your data and lock up drive for extra data security
• Installations; copy all your software on multiple PCs

The Toughest and Sportiest drive there is:
The ToughDrive Sport offers you, next to a unique sportive design, a drive that can withstand bumps and drops so your drive is still fully fucntional after it has dropped. You can still access your valuable files.

Secure hardware password protection
The ToughDrive Sport is equipped with a secure hardware 256bit password protection feature. Your password is encrypted and stored in a chip – the data on the drive can only be accessed by entering the correct password. The obligatory combination of the hardware chip and password to unlock the drive and access the data means that even if the internal hard drive is taken out of its original enclosure and assembled into another enclosure, people will never be able to access the data. Should you forget your password or should you lose your ToughDrive,
the only way for anyone to be able to continue using the drive is by reformatting it, thereby erasing all data. There is no possibility for password recovery. There is no safer way to protect your data !

A Rough Route Plan

Well, here is the planned route in its early stages. There is a lot more info to be put into the various waypoints - but I am slow and getting old

We want to get from Ohio to Oklahoma as quickly as possible, avoiding the major cities.

There is a lot of Route 66 stuff to see in Oklahoma and Texas. Then we have to cross New Mexico and at about half way across Arizona, we´ll head north to the Grand Canyon North Rim (we were at South Rim last time).

From there up into Utah and across to Nevada where we hope to ride `The Extraterrestrial Highway´- maybe we´ll meet some aliens who will give us the winning lottery numbers!

From Warm Springs, we´ll turn west to start at the beginning of Highway 50 - `The Loneliest Road in America´ (click here to watch a funny/cute video of this road) . I´ve already emailed the Nevada Tourist Board and they are sending us a `Loneliest Road´survival guide and some kind of paper that, if you get it stamped in various places along the 287-mile road and post it when (if?) you get to the other end, then you get a certificate (signed by the Governor of Nevada, by gum), a button and a bumper sticker. Kitsch, but I like that.

From there we will head down Highway 93 - The Great Basin Scenic Byway´.

Then it is back through Utah to Canyonlands, `Island In The Sky´ and Deadhorse State Park.

Hopefully, we will make it back to our favorite `cowboy town´ for the fourth time - Meeteetse in Wyoming. Then the long slog back: God willing.

If anyone has any suggestions of place `not to miss´near to our route, please let me know.


View Larger Map

GeoTagging

On each of the three previous trips, I have returned home with around 3,000 photos. It takes a fair while to sort through them believe me and, often, I can´t remember where we were at the time I took them - unless there is something very obvious in the picture.

So anything that helps keep track of the photos is a blessing. Again, after much research - considering a GPS for the bike, or a photo logger for the camera, I have decided on the Columbus V900 as it seems to provide the best of both worlds.

It is a tiny device - about the size of a large keyring.


It has BlueTooth and can be used with the Asus Netbook which also has BlueTooth. Using suitable software and it also will `tag´ my photos, giving Lat and Long and also altitude. And it will record voice memos.

But this review will give you all the info:

http://mobilitysite.com/index.php?s=columbus+v+900&x=0&y=0

USA Motorcycle Tour 2009: The Planning

A brief intro:

Motoguzzimomma here - my partner-in-adventure is motoguzziman. Since 2006 we have been flying to the USA to tour this beautiful country on our motorcycle - a Moto Guzzi Breva 750.

This year´s flights are now booked - we travel at the end of May. Insurances - bike, medical and travel are all sorted.

The route is tentatively planned - I´ll post details soon.

Also, I will be posting details of the electronics - cameras etc - that I´ll be taking and explaining why I chose these particular items and, down the line, letting you know how they perform and stand up to the rigors of life on the road.

Now I have time to start my blog - how organising is going and, meanwhile what day-to-day life is like here on Gran Canaria in the Canary Islands

Check out our 2007 trip here.

Loads and loads of photos of places like the Grand Canyon and the beautiful National Parks of Utah. Plus info on shipping a motorbike to Canada.