I want to thank all those of you who came out to Temecula to volunteer with the Temecula Hot Air Balloon and Wine Festival. It was a HUGE success.

Things went off with a few hitches beyond our control but we succeeded in our job function - managing HUNDREDS of cars find a place to park and hopefully allowing their drivers and passengers to reunite with the car when they wish to depart.

We were short on member participation by some and they missed out all the benefits which I will not address. Those of you who came out know what they were.

We brought out our team RV trailer. Mike (210) brought his RV and large equipment trailer which we were able to bring a CanAm to coordinate the various large parking lot venues. I brought back his equipment trailer while Mike towed his RV back and Rob (55) tower the team trailer back.

Some of our Affiliate members volunteered and assisted us this year. They were great and they want to return again next year.

Some of you worked Friday, some Saturday, some Sunday and some of you worked all three days. WOW! Thank you for your dedication. It was amazing and that is what makes us above other groups who just haven't done it as long as we have and have the experience and equipment we do. This does not ignore our members who helped just one day. We understand people have lives, jobs, and other commitments. THANK YOU to all who came out no matter how long. For our first timers we gave you traffic control instructions, radio operations, and exposure to some of what a CREST member does.

I have some aches and pains here and there. I'm sure you do too. I can't imagine the pains Mike has today and he has to work today. He didn't clear out until 7:30PM Sunday. Most of you have no idea what he does behind the scene. Just one job is transporting those THREE trailers from the Upper Desert where they are stored to Temecula and then seeing that all is returned back again. Did you see the BBQ setup he has on the back of his "Toy Box". That is all mainly for going to Glamis in the desert.

Communications worked well with Simplex. Yes, there was some immature adults on Santiago repeater but they cannot mess with us on our close proximity using simplex. We also had a portable repeater on line to use thanks to Dave (517). Finally, we had a cache of secret radios which we kept in the trailer "just in case" with frequencies nobody could get to. The cache of radios you saw and used were loaned to us from the event personnel. That way we could communicate directly with them also in need.

If we didn't give you a relief as often as we hoped it is due to lack of some of our members participation. We hope that corrects itself hereon. I know everyone who asked for a break got one. It is my intent you would not have to ask and we could count on a routine shift change for all.

If you have any suggestions, we would like to hear them. Just email me (CREST25@...) or to Mike (hvacallpro@...). We take this serious and we consider you our eyes and ears. One suggestion I have is for more signage. We also need arrow signs and proper mounts to fight against all signs tipping over in the wind so we don't have to keep propping them back up. I think someone mentioned white chalk lines for the parking lot. Well, that would be nice but can you imagine how much chalk and the job to do that. It also does not restore the properly back to its original state. All that property belongs to one man who controls how it is used.

It looks like our next scheduled event is a band competition later in the fall (October) and separate from our normal Savanna Band event in November.

Ed Greany, CREST 25, President

CREST Communications