New Year 2018

Got up early this morning to take advantage of the warm front that is passing through before the remnants of storm Eleanor hit us. It was a good idea for several reasons, firstly, it was another mild sunny morning:

I had to bring my own furniture this time:

You can see my, as yet, unfinished flight deck on the stool. The paddle slid round a bit, so sorry for the occasional QRD (that’s my excuse anyway). The stool was a God-send, because with 79 QSOs in total I was hard at it for almost 2 hours:

I have just discovered my first 2 New Years resolutions: buy a Ground Chair from SOTABEAMS; finish my flight deck asap. Thanks to all the chasers who came back to me, some of whom had to wait very patiently for their 2 points, it must be said. I also got ZL1BYZ in the log today, which is my best SOTA DX so far. There was also a nice 10pt S2S with F/PA0SKP/P. It just goes to show, if you keep at it, the DX comes eventually. The sky is darkening ominously as I write this, but tomorrow and the day after look fairly good, so I’ll probably get round to OE/ST-290 Hohe Rannach and OE/ST-484 Eggenberg before it’s back to work.

              73 de OE6FEG / M0FEU
                                          Matt
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Back to G/SP-015 on Wednesday 3rd January 2018. Now 70 SOTA activations in the last 64 days.

Called on 2m FM on the VX7 at the summit, and couldn’t raise a smile. Found a QSO on 145.350MHz but the ops trying to hear me reported that I was “too scratchy”.

I suspected a misdiagnosis, and that it was the considerable wind noise causing the problem. I moved myself to shelter under the cliff, and all was good.

Apart from the fact I couldn’t find a pencil in my pocket. So I used the voice recorder on my phone to capture the audio. That worked, and the task of transcribing the log later was not onerous - two QSOs!

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Thursday 4th January 2018, and I got an early telephone call, dispatching me on a day’s supply teaching at a lovely school in Leek, Staffordshire. I chucked my logbook and change of clothes in the car as I set off that morning!

My plans were slightly disrupted when I saw the timetable of the school I was at - the school day finished at 3.55pm. I’ve only known one school finish after 3pm in the last ten years, and that was 3.20pm!

Nonetheless, Gun G/SP-013 is only a very short detour off the A523 Leek-to-Macclesfield road, and then an easy flattish walk. Well it would be easy if it were not for the deep mud and puddles.

Just two stations came back to my 2m FM handie CQ call, so a two-contact activation it was. The weather was far too hideous to be hanging around, plus I had the Tall Trees CG monthly dinner to get to.

Tomorrow is the 12th and last day of Christmas - but I’ve already stopped reporting my Christmas activations in the Christmas 2017 thread, so maybe tomorrow will come the time to stop reporting my New Year 2018 activations in the New Year 2018 thread…

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Tom, shouldn’t all your Christmas and New Year activation reports be posted as just that - under the activation reports thread, rather than hijacking Jimmy’s posts? Just saying.

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Thanks for your comments Steve - this is the last one, I promise.

Friday 5th January 2018 - the 12th and final day of Christmas (but only the 5th day of the New Year…)

Another walk up The Cloud G/SP-015 with a handheld VHF radio. Such activating style may be scoffed at by some, but it is probably truer to the original intentions of SOTA circa 2002 (which talked about the increased availability and affordability of handheld transceivers) than much of the monster it has become (myself included).

Seven QSOs, all 2m FM. Looks like I just missed several S2S opportunities. And back home to do stuff.

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