Next Day in Gibraltar
Waking up to see nothing but the sun rising over the Mediterranean again made us appreciate the motorcaravanner's ability to have travel experiences that are just not available to others. Better still, we hadn't fallen over the cliff and into the sea during the night. After breakfast, it was time to do some more satellite testing. I set up the tripods and the table and switched on the Kathrein, the Alden and the Sat-Dome.
No 2D programmes would come through on any of the dishes - not surpising really as the official Astra map shows that you'd need a dish in excess of 1.2M diameter to receive BBC or ITV in Barcelona! However, we're still getting Channel 5 even on the Multimo and there are plenty of channels on Eurobird which are easily available. I've noticed that there are more and more channels which, even though they might have teleshopping at various times of the day, do show "proper" programmes as well. There are even some film channels (True Movies and Movies4Men) which show some decent films. Channels such as Russia Today and France 24 also show interesting programmes and there are many more channels that most people have never heard of which provide relaxing and informative entertainment. Horse & Country is excellent and available even on a 50cm dish everywhere we've been. And, of course, BBC radio is always available which, for many people is actually more important than TV. At the campsite in La Manga, I'd met a man who said that he had it on good authority that the reason that BBC radio had been moved to the south beam from Astra 2D was that the British armed forces had gone completely ballistic when they could no longer pick it up and the BBC relented. While looking over the edge at the very top of the rock the previous day, we had spotted a couple of motorhomes parked next to the sea on the east side of Gibraltar and, on the way back along the road that runs round the rock, we saw them again parked up in a parking area. One of them was a Rapdio from G.B. and had a Kathrein CAP 900 and an Alden Phenix on the roof. There was no-one home but I left a note as I was interested to hear how they were getting on with the Kathrein in particular.
No 2D programmes would come through on any of the dishes - not surpising really as the official Astra map shows that you'd need a dish in excess of 1.2M diameter to receive BBC or ITV in Barcelona! However, we're still getting Channel 5 even on the Multimo and there are plenty of channels on Eurobird which are easily available. I've noticed that there are more and more channels which, even though they might have teleshopping at various times of the day, do show "proper" programmes as well. There are even some film channels (True Movies and Movies4Men) which show some decent films. Channels such as Russia Today and France 24 also show interesting programmes and there are many more channels that most people have never heard of which provide relaxing and informative entertainment. Horse & Country is excellent and available even on a 50cm dish everywhere we've been. And, of course, BBC radio is always available which, for many people is actually more important than TV. At the campsite in La Manga, I'd met a man who said that he had it on good authority that the reason that BBC radio had been moved to the south beam from Astra 2D was that the British armed forces had gone completely ballistic when they could no longer pick it up and the BBC relented. While looking over the edge at the very top of the rock the previous day, we had spotted a couple of motorhomes parked next to the sea on the east side of Gibraltar and, on the way back along the road that runs round the rock, we saw them again parked up in a parking area. One of them was a Rapdio from G.B. and had a Kathrein CAP 900 and an Alden Phenix on the roof. There was no-one home but I left a note as I was interested to hear how they were getting on with the Kathrein in particular.
1 comment:
Yes, I agree. There's a fairly good selection of free channels on satellite now.
The film channels are pretty good depending what people like. I often watch Movies4Men for the westerns and other things.
Seems to be more free channels coming in 2008 too. The Golf Channel and Classic FM TV are however recent closures.
Thanks, Brian
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