p150

Not 100% corect there Ian - consider VK5/SE-005 Mt. Lofty and VK5/SE-013 Mt Gawler. Both are drive up summits with parking.

73 Ed DD5LP/VK2JI

P.S. I’m making no comment on the P100/150 discussion as I believe it has all been said already (several times over).

Why again such an intentionally exaggerated comparison as “argument”? Nobody required this summit in the garden. There are at least some simply pointing to the fact that with growing driving distance the level of activity will be negatively influenced - as is given by everyday reasons. Besides the “we expect activity to grow again” some minutes ago I missed so far some emotion for those simply doing SOTA for their fun and the fun of chasers and now being somewhat chased off by driving distance and needed time. One can say “farewell” with at least expressing sorrow or one can simply say “you expect too much and will be replaced soon” by those “real” hikers&hams not having to care about time.

Of course I - like possibly everyone here - did not read each and every line, but there was little impression that the MT somewhat regrets “collateral” losses of ops and activity - somewhat only appearing now again as whiners wanting a “good summit in the garden”.
But again there is a parallel in contesting where for a long time everyone who could not afford “full time” activity (24 up to 48h) was denounced as being not a “real contester” - as if ressouces had something to do with skill and spirit for the activity.
Chris DL8MBS

P.S.: On a funny sidenote: Arguments like “I have friends who don’t need the excuse of an activation to go to the mountains.” sounds like a Mercedes dealer advertising VW :wink:

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I wonder when at last people will realise that this is a done deal and stop wasting their time on posting messages that will go no where. As I have said and I will repeat endlessly SOTA is very simply a rewards scheme that awards certificates to radio amateurs who score points within the scheme by activating P150 summits. It is nothing else apart from concessions to extremely low profile countries/states to be P100 given real paucity of P150 summits. The judgement of that deviation from the original scheme design must be a decision for the scheme organisers and will be subject to verification based on available or evolving geographic data, Anyone can do any other scheme that they wish within an alternative platform but that will not be SOTA. SOTA is a specific definition - not ANY hills but P150 summit with some very clearly defined exceptions, It will not be dragged into other parameters where others are fully able to organise parallel schemes for alternative definitions.

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Evidently my sense of humour does not translate too well. Ignore it, then, and look at the point at the core of what I was saying. Here in a P150 Association most of us have to drive hundreds of kilometres to reach summits in the higher points bands, but SOTA has not faded away here, and I don’t suppose it will in DM or anywhere else.

As for Mercedes dealers advertising VW, it wasn’t an argument, it was an anecdote illustrating a point, and the point is that if you really, REALLY want to do something, you will find a way of doing it. My friends live, eat and breathe mountains - well, I do too, but though the spirit is willing the flesh is getting weak. Age can eventually take me out of the mountains but it won’t take the mountains out of me!

You are lucky, Chris, as Moderator it is my duty to read every post - even the posts on topics that bore me stiff! As for regrets - of course we regret any losses of ops and activity, but why should regrets impact on what we see as a duty?

Brian

Really? Isn’t it all too natural when paragraphs meet passion? Of course passion only wins in bad movies :wink:

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Of course, but it can endlessly and boringly go on infinitum. In fact this has been going on for so long. See my posts and those of our founder at Ive got the hump - #3 by G0CQK - you may have to scroll up or down a bit.

SOTA is what it says it is and will not be deflected by those who want it to do something else to meet their whim. Basically they are appealing to encompass other schemes that they are not capable of establishing themselves. Why should SOTA corrupt itself just to accommodate those who are incapable of setting up their own parallel schemes.

Each to their own. It all depends on the individual where they drive or want to drive. Some people only like to drive short distances and walk short hikes - some like it the other way, some just aren’t bothered.

I don’t often keep tally of my traveling and hiking distances but in 2011 and 2012 I did, I drove 9168.7 miles (14755.59 km) and hiked 566.14 km and that was to activate only 70 summits plus several more that weren’t attempted because the weather was - well rubbish.

I drive these distances to get to these hills so I can climb the hills. Taking the radio to play SOTA is a bonus to me and the chasers.

The cost in money and time is up to each individual on how much they spend. I don’t mind spending money traveling all those miles to get to a hill I haven’t climbed - I do travel many miles to climb non-SOTA hills as well.
But as I said each to their own… Personally I can’t see the point in football supporters spending all that money to follow a football team full of greetin sissies - but each to their own.

Anyway, P150 - SOTA started out as P150 so it should be P150. So a few people made some errors and summits that don’t qualify sneaked in to the system - they are just trying to sort the errors. If the P100 gets kept in place does that mean GM can get the 1800 odd summits that are P100.

Just my pennies worth. Personally I think this has gone on way too long, the weather is lovely for this time of the year so why don’t you all go out and play radio instead of debating over something that is going to happen anyway - its like listening to school bairns arguing. :wink:

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10000:500. That’s the nearest, and I’ve squashed and stretched the figures to make the ratio as low as possible. Even going by time it’s a 20 minute drive

Yeah, I was going by time, as that is what was defined in the initial mention of ratios. I interpreted an approximately 20 minute drive and a 2 minute walk from your earlier post.

[quote=“M1EYP, post:120, topic:10669”]approximately 20 minute drive[/quote]On average it probably takes nearer half an hour, or forty minutes plus if they’re digging the road to Biggin Hill again (something they seem inordinately fond of doing…).

Distance-wise, next nearest summit’s a good hour’s drive at off-peak time, but the next nearest after that can probably be reached in slightly less time because most of the route is motorway. I could do most of the mainland G/SE summits in a day trip from home without too much trouble. With some of them I could even fairly easily do two or three in the same day. Any much further afield, and overnight stays start figuring…

73, Rick M0LEP

Aye, well when you’ve activated all the GM SOTA summits that you practically can, there’s a pile of HuMPs awaiting your presence Neil. Perhaps you’ll have given up carrying the radio by then. :wink:

Marilyn, HuMP, in fact any hill would do. I just can’t seem to get my backside into gear since being off for all those months - even a stroll along the sea front is a chore. But I will get there.

I have activated a few of the HuMPs around here in the past but only because I was crossing over them to go somewhere else. I enjoyed the walk and just happened to have a handheld with me. Grabbed a few chaser points at the same time.

Unfortunately this has gone no-where. Except for people driving this to the top… … and that was not where I wanted to steer it.

We will see, I for one hate to see all those nice summits go. I will activate as many as possible on 1 day and use the hit and run way many already do and work the minimum of 4 qso’s. I have done this already and …well…it is not really fun.

Thanks to all for contributing in this,
73
on6uu

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Why do they need to go Frank? Surely someone could pick up the P100 summits and create a separate scheme along the lines that we have in the UK. Maybe there is a move towards that behind the scenes or maybe the summits will just be added to the GMA scheme. There is no need to lose anything - the hills will still be there. It just needs some organisation to facilitate the recording of activations and activators willing to go up them.

Or do they suddenly become no-go areas when they are longer part of SOTA? No, there IS life outside SOTA.

73, Gerald G4OIG

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Clearly logical Gerald. There is no reason why parallel schemes cannot co-exist. I think however it would be better for a parallel scheme based on P100 perhaps labelled HOTA i.e. Hundred(m) On The Air. or something similar rather than GMA being expanded where you can effectively walk down hill to a minor 5m or 10m uplift. After all we have multiple tiers of football leagues, rugby leagues, chess masters, motor racing (F1, F3, e,t,c,) and many other activities. Trying to cram every single activity into a one tier organisation would always be disastrous.

That is the way hill walking and mountaineering works. In the UK there are a number of tables of hills, in SOTA we are familiar with the Marilyns, any hill with a prominence of 150 metres, but there are the Munros, Scottish mountains above 3000 feet, the Corbetts, 2500 feet to 3000 feet with 500 feet prominence, the Grahams, 2000 feet to 2500 feet with 500 feet prominence, and so on to the Hewitts, hills of England and Wales above 2000 feet with at least 30 metres of prominence - the essential insanity of defining hills by imperial units with metric prominence is almost endearing! I have friends busy collecting the 3000 metre mountains of the Alps (I haven’t enquired about prominence) and they have a lot of fun and adventures! I’ve been into the hills for as long as I can remember, and it seems that a minor symptom of the mountain disease is this need for numbers and tables, I suppose it is something to occupy your mind in your spare time while you wait for your next trip to the mountains. Daft but somehow fulfilling!

What it boils down to is that SOTA is just one of many possibilities, just a selection from the broad palette of hills and mountains available to us. One day we may have a range of award schemes covering many possibilities, I see SOTA as a pioneer pointing the way to these future possibilities, perhaps one day when we have got all the likely Associations going it might be possible to incorporate some of them into SOTA, but for now we still have half the world to be incorporated!

Brian

Well Jim, as part of the Summitsbase HEMA scheme I have been enjoying some P100 summits up in your neck of the woods. Had I not been ill during my week away at Easter, I would have been looking at some decent challenges like Windy Gyle and The Schil. As it was, a chest infection, hacking cough and a bad cold kept me on the lower summits of Titlington Pike and Dod Law, but they were nonetheless enjoyable… dare I say it, rather more so than Lamberton Hill GM/SS-286, but don’t stone me for saying that!

73, Gerald G4OIG

If I ever manage to get my feet back in order (surgery on the left done, surgery on the right inevitable when it gets too bad) then I aim to activate the humps previously known as SB-002 and SB-003 but with now only humps references. I have operated radio from both before and would love to do again,
73 Jim

I well remember walking over Windy Gyle and The Schil!

http://tomread.co.uk/byrness_to_uswayford.htm
http://tomread.co.uk/uswayford_to_kirk_yetholm.htm

These two were visited on the respective last two days of our Pennine Way walk in 2006. Alas, well before the HEMA scheme came into being.

Similarly, we passed many trig points on that 20 day walk, but all well before the launch of the WAB Trigpoint scheme.

The greatest urge to revisit somewhere though, is for the SOTA summits on Ibiza and Menorca that we have visited in the past, but well before there was any EA6 association!

I think to say this is neither true nor fair.

Twice a week I go to work on foot over the beautiful nearby hill. This hill being climbed has a topographic prominence of roughly 30m. But, in doing so, the only practical footpath requires 200m to be climbed - if you do not want to go three times greater horizontal distance and to climb the cumulative altitude differences of 130m. This summit - and there are many such in the Highland - has a topographic prominence of only around 30m. This is the case of the long ridges.

Topographic prominence is just a number in terms of hike difficulty and above sea level itself as well.

Finally, the SOTA rules also allow you to be lazy: You can go up the hill on an electric motor bicycle (diesel quad 4x4, snowmobile or simply off-road car) close to the top and then transmit only a few inches away from it!

Karel

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Have you actually read the rules, Karel?

“4. Summits that are accessible by road can still be included in the programme, although operation from within vehicles or the near vicinity of activators vehicles is not permitted.”

and:

“14. All SOTA operations are expected to be conducted in the spirit of the programme.”

If you are visualising an award program where the summits are graded by difficulty rather than prominence, then you would have to accept that each summit will have a prescribed route to it and leaving that route would invalidate the ascent.

Brian