Belgium SOTA comes to UK

On Saturday 10th November Belgium SOTA comes to UK. ON4UP, ON9CBQ, ON5CMB, and ON4ROS (G1NZB) will be taking the Calais/Dover ferry to activate summits GS/SE 015 Cheriton; GS/SE 013 Detling; and GS/SE 005 Botley. Weather permitting it is intended to operate several stations 4m, 20m, 40m. Details to be posted on the SOTA Alerts/Spots.

On Sunday 11th it is planned to visit the West London Radio & Electronics Show at Kempton Park and we hope to be able to meet up with some like-minded SOTA activators/chasers whilst at the show. We shall be QRV on 145.500.

73s Douglas ON4ROS

In reply to ON4ROS:
Have a great time in the UK, usually when i drive over to the continent i go to and from Dunkirk, closer to Belgium and also i have found to be cheaper

73s
Mark

In addition to 40m and 20m stations we will be QRV activating summits on 2m SSB as well as 4m FM during visit to the UK this Saturday 10th November.
Hoping that the weather will be kind to us so we can activate all three summits during the day!!
Details on SOTA Watch Alerts…

73’s Douglas ON4ROS

At present the forecast seems to be suggesting rain early in the day, and less rain later. Good luck. :slight_smile:

74, Rick M0LEP

Rain … we know everything about it in Belgium Rick.
I am very curios about the possibilities on 2m and 4m in the SOTA home country. On 2m, I have packed a HB9CV and my 857 with 50W. On 4m, I intend to make my very first SOTA contacts with a Wouxun KG-699 and a 300-ohm ribbon cable Slim Jim.

Hear you Saturday!
Peter - M/ON4UP/P

In reply to ON4UP:

Hi Peter - hope you have a successful trip. You may struggle for contacts on 4m FM, however people may be monitoring for you after reading the alert. 2m FM should be ok with the 857. When I did the G/SE hills on 2m FM years ago I struggled with an FT817 with 3ele beam. Now SOTA is more popular, you should make plenty of contacts. If you did G/SP or NP with FT857 on 2mFM then 100+ contacts would be easily achieved. Have a good trip.
Steve. (in rainy Buxton with the lights on at 1500).

In reply to M0LEP:

Rain? Tell me about it! Rain in England I accept. I’m 15mins from the Med and it’s greyer and wetter than a typical day in Scotland.

This is not in the script :frowning:

At least it’s not cold!

Andy
F/MM0FMF

In reply to MM0FMF:
.
Could be worse, Andy. One December, I encountered significant snow in Malaga, which is one minute from the Med and swarming with Brits in that month. They looked shell-shocked.
.
Elliott, K6ILM

In reply to MM0FMF:
Sorry to say that there is worse to come, Andy, with a nice little depression forming over the Western Med by Sunday. I’m not gloating, mate - honest!

73

Brian G8ADD

In reply to G8ADD:
/pantomime mode on “Oh yes you are” /pantomime mode off

Roger G4OWG

In reply to G8ADD:
Well my local weatherman (brother in law)said yesterday “I can hear the motorway so tomorrow it will rain”. He was right. He’s saying grey tomorrow, OK for a BBQ Sunday and sun then rain Monday.

He’s seems to know his onions. -:slight_smile:

I’ve been quaffing Vin Primeur all day whilst eating home made sausage and Corsican sausage so I’m now pleasantly relaxed.

Andy
F/MM0FMF

It’s pretty soggy here round the south east corner of the M25 this morning. Forecast now says it might stop raining this afternoon…

73, Rick M0LEP

In reply to MM0FMF:

Come back to Scotland - wall to wall blue sky, no wind, forecast for 10 degrees, high pressure on its way.

If only I could get up a hill…!

Barry GM4TOE

In reply to GM4TOE:

Well there was 35mm rain last night and it was grey this morning. By lunchtime it was high altitude grey cloud. My local WX expert (beau-frere) was correct as he said sunny by late afternoon. It was 18C in the garden as I played with the 20m antenna. That tuned up with no-effort for once. I worked a few Europeans to confirm everything was working whilst I was sat under the almond tree watching the sun set.

Expected sunny tomorrow and maybe 18C again. T-shirt weather in fact. However, the nice lady in the Tour de Constance admissions office in Aigues-Mortes asked my sister if I was not cold with me not wearing a jacket. When she found I was from Scotland, she stood up to check if I had a kilt on. She was sadly disappointed.

Andy
F/MM0FMF

In reply to ON4ROS:
Thanks for the activations. I hope you had fun and didn’t get too wet. I managed to catch ON4UP on Detling (which was, it seems, my first successful VHF chase from home - my other VHF chases have all been /M or /P). Sorry not to have found you at Kempton, but I gather you did find at least some SOTA folk there. :slight_smile:

73, Rick M0LEP

We had a lot of fun on our SOTA road trip to and from Kempton. Although we were welcomed by “very nice British weather” on Saturday, we successfully activated G/SE-015 and 013. Four activators used 3 stations: 2 on HF and 1 on VHF. After having visited the Kempton fair, we activated G/SE-005 which was initially planned for the day before. A nice blue sky and another successful activation was all we needed to return satisfied via Dover to Belgium.
On HF, Franz ON9CBQ and Douglas ON4ROS activated 40m while Erik ON5CMB was activating the higher bands. I did some successful experiments with 2m SSB contacts mainly to ON. Also I could make my first 4m SOTA contact on G/SE-005.
One thing is sure; we will come back to the home country of SOTA!

73, Peter M/ON4UP/P