Welcome back to the international ether, warsteiner. Your biggest culture shock
will be in discovering that most of the stations you remember are historic
memories! As previously stated, you'll need cap mods to improve the a.g.c.,
audio, & sync performance on ICOM's R75. A cheaper alternative would be Yaesu's
Century Frog, a.k.a. FRG-100. As for being out of the loop, your receivers will
do just fine, excepting a little drift during warm-up. You might just find the
audio response of current models extremely lacking compared to your stable of
collector's items. Before you go hog wild & spend several C notes on a
receiver, peruse the bands with your current collection & see what's out there.