2016 GM Island Trip - Mull

Just a brief heads up to advise that Paul G4MD and I will be on the Isle of Mull this coming week. Our accommodation has the luxury of WiFi so we will post alerts on a daily basis once we have determined which summits we are activating on which day. The weather might play a role in this, but we have thankfully missed the heat wave of this past week. We will no doubt be attracting horizontal driving sleet - why change things when we know that type of weather works for us. :wink:

73, Gerald G4OIG

Hey whatā€™s this trying to ā€˜cash-inā€™ on another of my early SOTA island activations!! (Lovely island and lots to explore - but I guess playing radio gets in the way :grin:)

Great Gerald (Paul).

My shack at home is in transit to a new location in the ā€˜hooseā€™ (been working on the project since Jan hope to have it completed next month then back ā€˜ootā€™ on the hills :yum:) so will try and get you from a portable/mobile set-up. Possibly some Completes in the offing?

73

Jack(;>J

PS: With all the dry wx we have had over the last few weeks the ground underfoot might be ā€˜fairlyā€™ dry :umbrella:

Hi Jack

Good luck with the shack rebuild, started mine in 2001 and itā€™s still a work in progress :-s

Be good to work you over the next week, we should be on (weather permitting) every day between tomorrow and Friday, hoping to bag a dozen plus summits :slight_smile:

Let us know which summits you need as completes to assist in our planning! Afraid tomorrow wonā€™t help - two previously inactivated summits on the radarā€¦ both with trigs as well (alerts now posted).

Well you know what our presence does to the weather so those ā€œfairly dryā€ summits are due to become quaking bogs in the very near futureā€¦

Hope to catch you tomorrow

73 de Paul G4MD

Iā€™ll be on Mull at the end of August for a week. Iā€™m also hoping to do some SOTA (and fishing :smile:).

Mullā€™s Internet is very good indeed to say itā€™s an island.

Enjoy your trip guys, hope the WX is good - every time Iā€™ve been to Mull itā€™s been super hot, with hardly any rain. Iā€™ve been twice in April, once in May and once in August. The locals tell me Iā€™m lucky, I obviously take good weather with me :smile:

We took a trip across to Iona from Mull last April - this is my son walking up from the beach. We were running for the ferry back to Mull and my XYL suggested I take the picture, itā€™s one of my favourite pictures!

I really enjoy the Hebrides, I feel a deep connection. My father once owned a house on Coll and I was named Colin as a nod towards to Island. Iā€™m planning my first trip back to Coll in over 30 years for this summer.

See - it was even sunny on Coll last time I was there!

73, Colin

2 Likes

Ho ho! No wonder those two havenā€™t been activated. Looks a rather serious dayā€™s bagging. Sadly I think your times will be off sync with me so an S2S is unlikely but we may be lucky. WX looks like it will good for the early part of the day. The forecast doesnā€™t sound brilliant for later in the week but you and Gerald are hard men. It was nice and sunny today when I was cutting the grass but it was anything but warm.

Letā€™s hope the sky works.

1 Like

Thanks Colin. Great pics :smiley:

The broadband WiFi at our cottage is certainly doing the business :slight_smile: Today has been a cracking day with wall to wall sunshine and a cloudless sky (though a tad chilly with a cool breeze). Sadly our arrival seems to have signalled the end of a spell of unprecedented hot and calm weather and itā€™s set to deteriorate from hereon in. An all to familiar story to Gerald and myself :-s. Can you let us in on the secret of your weather charming?

Hope you have a great time here yourself, perhaps catch you from a summit or two over the next week

73 de Paul G4MD

Hi Andy

Yes, an interesting pair! Really looking forward to them. Keeping plans for the rest of the week flexible as the weather forecasts above two hours ahead are often no more than fantasy in these parts :wink:

Shame our summit times donā€™t coincide but you never know what might happen so will keep an ear out for you. Would be nice to complete Queensbury :smiley:

Skyā€™s been like the weather of late so hoping weā€™ll catch it at a good timeā€¦

My XYL has another term for it :-s

73 de Paul G4MD

PS Iā€™m guessing our activation times arenā€™t as far apart as your alert suggestsā€¦ unless youā€™re going for the exotic DX :wink:

Disastrous day today band conditions awful assisted by inability to self spot due to fancy new touch screen phone screen being unreadable in all but a darkened room :frowning: apologies to anyone who was looking for me.

Hoping for better tomorrow

73 de Paul G4MD

First summit today was a bit slow, but things were ā€œback to normalā€ for the second - many thanks to all the regular chasers who ā€œkept the faithā€ and to MW0XOT/P and GW4AZS/P for the s2sā€™s :smiley:

Forecast for tomorrow is heavy rain all afternoon so weā€™re wimping out and only planning one summit in the morning (GM/SI-106) followed by an afternoon of R&R. Also Trig point TP1223 for those that want it :slight_smile:

Hearā€™s hoping the sky is behaving, looking forward to catching as many of you as possible tomorrow

73 de Paul G4MD

According to reports the current fOF2 at 1930z is 7.2MHz in Belgium, which is higher than during the day!

GO home and take it back with you! :unamused:

1 Like

It looks a bit rubbish for you tomorrow. We donā€™t get the predicted deluges till early evening. Wednesday looks to be quite bonny for you (and meh for us on the East) but Thursday is utter mince for everyone. And so is Friday morning but the afternoon may be OK. See this is typical GM SOTApedition weather. Itā€™s either good WX and rubbish propagation or rubbish WX and good propagation. Or most typically, rubbish WX AND rubbish propagation!

Iā€™d suggest you drown your sorrows on Wednesday by investigating the local whisky but youā€™re on Mull and the local hooch, Tobermory is a bit like horse liniment. But less palatable and no use on horses either!

Best of luck for tomorrow.

2 Likes

Hi Gerald,

Were you really on SI-105 (as spotted) at 0851 UTC today, whilst Paul was on SI-106?
Itā€™s rather confusing.
:slight_smile:
73,
Walt (G3NYY)

Weā€™re not greedy Neil we were going to leave it here for you :wink:

Nah Walt, finger trouble. You should know what itā€™s like on a summit. Then again, have you been to Mull? :wink:

73, Gerald G4OIG

P.S. Only joking. ā€¦ I asked Scottie of the Starship Enterprise to beam me over to Skye just to wind you up.

Started raining just as we packed up, got heavier as we descended, back at our cottage now (which conveniently happens to be at the foot of the hill :slight_smile: ) and itā€™s lashing down outside.

Propagation not brilliant but not as bad as last Sunday :-s Thanks again to you chasers out there looking for us your persistence in the face of adversity is much appreciated!

Right, time for a bit of dinner then a trip out to sample the fleshpots of Tobermory :wink:

73 de Paul G4MD

1 Like

There was an artisan chocolate shop when I was there, ooh 13 years back. Very nice, very pricey!

Very priceyā€¦ hmm, that rules me out getting the wallet out. My XYL will be looking over my shoulder. Based on your recommendation, I wonā€™t be looking for the local spirit eitherā€¦ shame when only a few islands away, there is a multiplicity of excellent tipplesā€¦ and decent beer as well.

ā€œMulled wineā€ comes to mind ā€¦

Iā€™ll get my coat.
:wink:

73,
Walt

1 Like

Nothing like that. Just a nice bottle of Shiraz this evening. Made a change from the beer we bought in Oban before crossing over. Probably back on the ale tomorrow evening. Got to keep it sensible though - the heavy rain we have had this afternoon will no doubt have made it slippery underfoot. Weā€™ll probably find more frogs from tomorrow. Just the usual cuckoos, orchids, deer, golden eagles so farā€¦ you know, every day stuff. :wink:
73, Gerald G4OIG