Well, today was an unusual day, so lets set the stage… First we go to church and when we get home, there really isn’t much to do so I decide to run over to my local park and get an activation in during the afternoon. This turns out to be the beginning of an adventure for the next few hours that almost DIDN’T happen!
My N6ARA Tiny Paddle got some use today.
You see it all started at home when I was testing a power cord for my TR-35 radio. I wanted to add a cord to the POTA tote that I was assembling and I found one that looked like a good candidate. So I get the radio out and plug it into my shack power supply to see if the QRP rig would power up properly and it did. It worked perfectly. So then I put the cord in the kit as a permeant addition to the POTA tote. Once this test was complete I got my N6ARA paddle out of the other bag and added it to the kit and then I was off to the park.
There was at least twenty groups on the course this big! So many people were there playing disc golf!
When I arrived at the park, I was in for a surprise! The parking lot was almost full of cars! This parking lot is normally reserved for me and me alone! LOL! I am used to seeing maybe 6 cars on one end of the lot where the beginning of the disc golf course is located but that is all! There were disc golfers everywhere for some sort of tournament. I was worried I would not be able to setup, but as lady luck was on my side, I found a good spot and got the antenna in place.
This is where things take a turn for the worse. I get the antenna setup and hop in the truck to layout the radio gear and find I forgot the actual radio. I had all the support equipment but no radio. It seems when I tested the power cord that I failed to put the actual radio in the POTA tote… I felt totally defeated to be honest and almost just broke it down and was about to give up. So I thought I would call the wife to see if she would help out and she agreed to meet me half way in Trenton and bring it to me. So I laid the antenna assembly on the ground and ran down to Trenton to grab the radio, hoping all along that no one would bother the antenna laying in the grass beside the parking lot.
This saved the activation to be quite honest about it. It added about 15 minutes or so to the time table to drive down to Trenton and back and fortunately, no one bothered the antenna (seems my worries about disc golfers being curious were unfounded) and I was able to get on the air after all.
This is when I found the next problem… There was some sort of contest this weekend on CW that I was unaware of and the band was super crowded. I was starting to think I couldn’t find an open frequency when I landed on 14.068 mhz and no one was there! At least no one was near enough to me for me to hear them… So I waited a few minutes and listen and nothing. I call QRL a couple of times and then get going. This is noted by the “on air” start time and the actual time I started making contacts. I normally don’t wait a full ten minutes, but this time is was probably 6 or 7 minutes and then it took a few calls to get QSOs coming in… I do other admin stuff while I am listening as well, such as getting my POTA spot on the website and positioning my gear in the truck for max comfort and such.
Another reason I didn’t just move to a WARC band was that I only have a hamstick for 20 meters at this time. I plan to pick up a couple more at the Dalton Hamfest in a couple of weeks from the time of writing this blog… I hope they have some! Below you can see the “POTA tote” and my rig for the day, the Penntek TR-35. This is truly one of my favorite radios and would have been the radio I carried to Hawaii had I been able to confirm that my tuned EFHW antennas would stay in tune in varied setups due to terrain… I plan to test this once I get back from the trip, but we leave in the morning as of this writing and I didn’t have time to test the idea properly prior to leaving.
The log sheet speaks for itself. There is a number of Canadian hams this time as well as the one to Italy as well. I couldn’t believe how many calls I got in such a short time. This was an amazing activation for me and to think, I almost gave up when I failed to bring the radio… Then as fast as it started, it abruptly stopped. When the last entry was written down I called CQ probably 5 more times with no replies so I called QRT and packed up. What an afternoon!!! This just goes to show that 5 watts has the magic if you get on the right band at the right time!
So if your thinking that you wont have a good time with your radio and there is no sense in even setting up, just remember this blog post and how I even forgot the darned radio!!! So get out there and warm up that atmosphere!!!
72 de WK4DS