Today, I activated DL/AL-151 “Wertacher Hörnle” (1684 M / 5525 ft), which is a popular and pretty easy ski-touring summit in the region.
Directions and approach:
There are plenty of route descriptions on the Internet, e.g. Wertacher Hörnle Skitour Allgäuer Alpen. The best map is DAV BY3, “Allgäuer Voralpen Ost”, ISBN-13 978-3-937530-43-7. You start at a small parking area at the right side of state road B310 between Unterjoch and Oberjoch. The exact stop is called Obergschwend, but Google Maps does not know the proper location of this, so watch out. You then follow the open area in a W-WNW direction, passing a small hut (“Buchel Alpe”, open in winter at least on weekends) and then with various alternative routes in a NW direction to the summit.
Attention: The point marked on Google Maps from the link SOTA Summits is not the actual summit but the position of a much lower signpost. See this map for the difference. This should be corrected in the database. In summer, it is just a 500 m longer walk, but in winter, the part from the signpost to the actual summit with a cross is the only part of the entire journey that is a modest challenge (see pictures).
Equipment used:
Rig: Mountain Topper MTR-5B in my GoBox enclosure
Antenna: EFHW with traps for 40-30-20m designed by @HB9BCB; inverted-L deployment as inspired by @WA6MM 's QRZ page (scroll to the bottom of the page).
Mast: Decathlon 6m carbon-fiber pole, 340g.
Activation:
Based on the lessons learned in the past months, I focussed on 40m for qualifying the summit and 20m for some DX. The QRP section around 7.030 was very crowded, so I moved to 7.0024 MHz. I was QRV at 15:24Z, started calling CQ and was spotted by RBN almost immediately.
Sat 15:29 DK3IT/P on DL/AL-151 7.0024 cw
*[RBNHole] at DL3KR 16 WPM 13 dB SNR (Posted by RBNHOLE)
At 15:42Z, I changed to 14.060 MHz and was again spotted quickly, and RBNhole took it up, too:
Sat 15:42 DK3IT/P on DL/AL-151 14.0601 cw
*[RBNHole] at CT1BOH 16 WPM 4 dB SNR (Posted by RBNHOLE)
All in all, I was able to log 8 QSOs on 40m and 3 on 20m, of which two were DX into North America, special thanks to @N4EX and @N1GB! Because my antenna was not well-tuned for 20m in the inverted-L configuration, I had to switch back to 2.5 W and was quite impressed to make it into NA despite this!
Thanks to Mariusz @SP9AMH for spotting me and indicating the change to 20m!
At 15:49Z, I had to go QRT, because it was getting dark and foggy, and my fingers were also getting cold.
A big thanks to all chasers! I cannot appreciate their effort often enough; it is really a give and take, and I could not manage my winter activations with short time on summit without their willingness to chase me in the short windows of time I can spend on the summit!
Attached, please find a few pictures.
73 de Martin, DK3IT
First Part of the Ascent:
Ascent:
Actual Summit:
Operating Position:
Antenna Mount on Avalance Shovel:
Rig:
Propagation:
Log:
