Greetings all
I’m pondering the cellular coverage at the Yellowstone fishing bridge rv park (before going there) and find that Verizon has a tower nearby. However Data access suitable for Zoom (for example) is another matter.
I’m pondering an external antenna for my cat18 (which is wonderful!) Just wondering if anyone has used the likes of a 42g (which I would mount on my fifth wheel ) or if something more serious/directional is necessary. Thanks for your comments
I was in that area in September 2022. There is a verizon tower in the area - I think it’s near Yellowstone Lake Lodge. There is no ATT or T-Mobile in that area. If you go near the waters edge by the Bridge Bay you can get connected to that tower in a usable way. As soon as you go back into the campground it will appear to connect but it will be UNUSABLE - even with high powered omni antenna setup.
When I was at Bridge Bay I used Starlink. I also have a directional antenna which I did not bother with as my campsite had no starlink obstructions. I think the directional antenna would have worked, but like I said I did not try it. Your definitely going to want a directional antenna for Yellowstone, especially since you have a 5th wheel setting up a directional shouldnt be too much added work. Also having it on a MAST will help!
If your curious about what setup I was using in Yellowstone look in this forum I posted a video walk-thru. I actually talk about Yellowstone during the video.
Other areas I was at in the park:
Old Faithful - strongest coverage. Verizon only. Very fast verizon
Bridge Bay - (see above)
Falls/Canyon area - ATT & Verizon worked however the tower is ATT. - not very fast. I used my directional antenna here cuz I was back in the woods/too many starlink obstructions.
Tower area - Verizon only - not fast at all. but usable
West Thumb - Verizon coverage
Mammoth Hot Springs - Verizon coverage
Excellent! Thank you. My only follow up question is this. When you Said as soon as you get back to the campground the Verizon tower is unusable with an omni. Is it usable with a long directional? I have enough ham radio experience to understand wave propagation and antenna gain. From your description it sounds like one would need substantial gain over an omni
How I would best describe it is that I was getting ONE bar with the setup I have in the Bridge Bay campground. (I had a VZW SIM in both modems of the BR2 Pro and each one was behaving identically. ATT sim would not pick up anything)
They were passing health checks somehow - but I could not even pull up simple web pages. Did all the troubleshooting tricks and no changes on my end would get more than that.
I did not bother fiddling with the directional on the mast at Bridge Bay, once I got starlink connected I was “set”.
My guess is that a directional antenna would have gotten usable connectivity. An omni alone for sure will NOT work back in the campground.
There are a lot of camp sites at that campground. Lots of competition for airwaves. If being connected is really important I would recommend going with a directional setup - chances of it working well are better.
What bands do the Verizon tower there operate? Do you know Is this a 4g tower perhaps? I’m talking about the one nearest the fishing bridge rv park. I’m building a test case in my mind to optimize the antenna. For example if it’s the lower frequency bands that’s a more difficult antenna problem to solve
