After only working a handful of stations from home on Saturday due to limited radio time, I thought I’d try to make up for it on Sunday with an activation of G/SP-011 Freeholds Top with Scott 2E0RCS.
Although the Sun was out for most of the afternoon it was very windy & without our tents, anything other than handheld contacts would have been quite difficult. As it was, the tents gave adequate shelter from the wind & we both had a very enjoyable afternoon. Our first contacts upon reaching the trig point were with Jimmy M3EYP/P & Tom M1EYP/P on Kinder Scout which was very nice
Scott was soon set up for 40m SSB so I picked a spot on the other side of the Trig point as I was also going to be working HF.
I put out several calls on 80m SSB but only managed one contact, with Graham 2E0JYK near Ely in Cambridgeshire. Although I could have spotted myself, I chose not too as I had the luxury of several other bands available to try. The first one I tried after 80M was 6M SSB where I found Tony 2W0LAE/P on GW/NW-012, which made my fourth contact of the afternoon another summit to summit I was then called by Mike G4BLH using very low power into a 10M yagi, not a bad contact as I was using about 30 Watts into a 60M dipole. HI
After a couple more contacts on 6M I called Mike again on 4M FM using the Wouxon KG699E & a quarter wave telescopic antenna & was very surprised at how well it worked. After a call from Ian M3LIU I QSY’d to 60M & had another summit to summit QSO with Ian GW8OGI/P on GW/NW-028 He had finished working on FE so he kindly left me with the frequency & I then had most of my further contacts on that band.
I was quite disappointed that I never managed to complete QSO’s with G1KLZ & G0TDM, but the QSB was working against us I’m afraid.
After HF I set up the 4M J-Pole & called CQ SOTA on 70.450FM. I was answered by Steve GW7AAV & had a further 6 QSO’s on 4M including another summit to summit with Ian GW8OGI/P, which was his first S2S on 4M FM
I popped my head out of my tent & Scott was already packed up & ready to go so I packed my gear & we made our way home.
As I mentioned in an earlier post I took several photos & some video, which I have now edited & put online.
Thanks to everyone that worked me or Scott on what was a very enjoyable afternoon.
My video of the afternoon is here:
http://www.dogswebspace.com/g0voffreeholdstop.htm
I hope you enjoy watching it as much as I enjoyed making it
73,
Mark G0VOF