Puerto Rico Vacation

[Tom_G]

I will be taking a trip to PR in April and I was thinking about bringing a dual-band HT for HAM use and monitoring of Public Service.
Is most Public service and HAM in Spanish ?
I was also looking to see if there is any D-Star repeaters in PR.

Any assistance would be appreciated... Thanks,

 

[hunterx]

Hello:

All Public Service communications are in Spanish. In English you can monitor the airport , some rare uncrypted Federal Government, and Coast Guard.

I hope you enjoy your vacation in Puerto Rico

 

[WP4MZR]

http://www.kp4ip.net

The repeaters are linked to many others here in the states via IRLP so about 50% of the traffic is in English or Spanglish(mixed spanish/english)

 

[Tom_G]

Good Info....

hunterx and WP4MZR,
This is good information.
I guess I'm going to bring my HT with me and try to make some contacts.
Thanks, Tom/G

 

[silverbk]

I will be taking a trip to PR in April and I was thinking about bringing a dual-band HT for HAM use and monitoring of Public Service.
Is most Public service and HAM in Spanish ?
I was also looking to see if there is any D-Star repeaters in PR.

Any assistance would be appreciated... Thanks,

I brought several HT's with my on both my trips and many of the repeater users speak English as well as Spanish so you can actually have a QSO.

Every public safety freq I monitored was in Spanish. I was not in the proper part of the Island to monitor USCG or the Army at Ft Buchannan.

If you make it over to the Virgin Island the repeaters there are very useful for getting local info.

If you head to Aruba you will need a VHF marine, as this is how a lot of the Island still communicates, you can call cabs, call for launch pick up, and make dinner reservations on VHF marine.

I also found that having FRS or GMRS radios to be very useful when touring the Island as our cell phones did NOT work. Make sure you have radios with CTCSS because FRS is very popular in PR.

Good Luck

73