Conachcraig GM/ES-019
My plan was to escape the Shire for some high mountain in central Scotland, such as Schiehallion GM/CS-005 and to try and reach these lads on 2m for a bit of sport. Unfortunately the heavy snow forecast curtailed these plans. I didn’t want to take the risk of a snow gate closure stopping me leaving, or even worse, returning to Aberdeenshire after an expedition.
That left me with a short list of local summits which would provide protection from the forecasted 30kph north wind. Summit temperatures were forecast to be -6°C with -10 to -12°C windchill. Snow showers were forecast, but it looked like there was a window of decent weather around the planned activation time of 1000z (11am BST). I settled on Conachcraig GM/ES-019, 865m high.
I set off from home at 0730BST, arriving at the Glen Muick car park around 40 mins later, having driven on a couple of cm of new snow most of the way. Parking is now £5 for a car here and they have fancy new machines that take contactless payment and don’t freeze up in winter like the old ones did, so no more free winter parking! TBH, I don’t mind as there’s a Ranger station as well as a picnic area and decent toilets.
It took me an hour to hike up the Land Rover track that first crossed the glen floor before ascending up to a col, bealach or saddle (depending on where you’re from).
across Glen Muick to Conachcraig
Here the main track continues down to Balmoral castle. (The approach from Balmoral is far nicer and on a better track that can be cycled, however is longer.) A left turn takes you towards Lochnager. However today I was going right up a narrow path through the heather, easy at first but steeper and more bouldery towards the top. Fifteen minutes later I popped out on top.
the junction and path leading up to Conachcraig
Conachcraig summit tors, looking over to Lochnagar GM/ES-008
I was worried that I would be late. I had planned on being there an hour early. This was my first “summer” activation and the GMT/BST thing was confusing me. I had memories of always getting the time wrong on activations last summer, but couldn’t remember why. I really should have reset my watch to UTC at the car park.
I found a great spot to set up behind a granite tor. South facing and plenty of protection from the wind. The reason I chose Conachcraig.
As soon as I arrived, I took out the FT-3d and had a quick QSO with Simon @GM4JXP, who now has incentive to activate this hill for a Complete!
Summit radio station
The station consisted of an Elecraft kx-2, with a W3EDP antenna connected directly to the radio. The antenna was arranged as inverted V over a 7m Spiderbeams pole. The antenna was arranged west to east. It would be the first real test of my home-made 3S Li-Po internal battery. I’d brought a spare too.
Turns out I was an hour early, so I spun up 15m SSB and called CQ. @SV3IEG Dinos came straight back with 5/7. I worked another three and then went to 17m.
17m produced seven QSO’s with Eric @F5JKK finding me (5/7). I took a break for a wander around and to get some blood flowing into my extremities, then settled down for a 20m session.
Eric found me again on 20m. We both agreed 17m was better. Sixteen QSO’s on 20m, nothing special distance-wise, but lots of new callsigns.
After that spell I had another jump around in the snow to warm up and as the time was now approaching 1100BST, I settled down for the summit to summit session.
James M(W)0GQC was on GM/SW-007 and had found space on 40m. No Spot, but a WhatsApp to the group. James gave me 5/5. Then David @EI5IMB came on from EI/IN-022. After exchanging reports I had to drop off. The SWR had rocketed and the KX-2’s protection circuits were kicking in. No amount of tuning would fix it. I was able to get a decent SWR and get back in the game by inserting my 9:1 un-un.
Davids signal had been so strong that I’d turned off the pre-amp. Of course when Chris @M0RSF came on from G/NP-028, I forgot to turn it back on and struggled to do much more than exchange signal reports with him! My Bad. Sorry Chris.
Pleasantries and weather conditions exchanged, we all went our separate ways and probably gave some Chasers a seizure by all spotting a different 40m SSB frequency within seconds of one another!
I worked a further 23 stations on 40m, the highlight for me being @LA5WNA, as I hardly ever work Norwegian stations from NE Scotland.
By now, I’d been on top for two hours and was just about frozen to the ground. Once I prised myself free of the snow, I quickly packed up and headed down by the same route of ascent, taking around an hour to do so.
much of the lower lying snow had shifted by afternoon. Lochnagar summit now in the clear in the distance
So, by the time I got back I’d realised why all the clock changing nonsense confused me. It wasn’t being late for summits that caught me out. It was when I’d finished activating and then messaged Mo with what time I’d be home. Most of the time I would give her a UTC time and then turn up an hour later than planned, my brain still working in radio time. Oops!
Anyway, a great idea from James. Hugely enjoyable and with 2+ hours on a summit and 56 QSO’s (my PB) my biggest fear is that I’m turning into Simon. 
from sotamaps
So Chris, never too cold for a video, although the GoPro did eat batteries at sub-zero temperatures. Oh, and the Li-Po performed brilliantly, keeping the 10 watt output throughout, despite the cold. I don’t see what all the fuss is about kx-2’s dropping to 5 watts after a short while…
73, Fraser
