After a few days of bad weather on Sunday the forecast was finally good and I decided to go on an outing in the mountains with related Sota activation. The choice fell on Monte Crepacuore I/LZ-010, a beautiful 1997 meter high mountain located in the Ernici Mountains chain which can be reached in about two hours by car from Rome. Together with a friend we left early and at ten we found ourselves in Campo Catino from where the path towards Monte Crepacuore begins.
The walk, which lasted about an hour and a half, was truly splendid, almost all along the ridge and we also passed near an active spring which, which is very strange here in the Apennines at the end of summer, from where we were able to drink very good water fresh.
Once I reached the top I set up my usual Sota station, this time in a simplified version, no fishing rod, I used the metal cross as a support for the longwire which I connected to a 9:1 balun. As soon as I started doing radio traffic the weather around us changed, big black clouds approached the peaks and a great wind picked up.
The result was that I only made 20 QSOs using 20 meters on SSB and 30 meters on CW and then I decided to do QRT to start the descent towards Campo Catino. Thaks to @IK2LEY and @DL6GCA and @HB9CBR for the s2s !!
The clouds got bigger and darker but luckily they didn’t turn into rain and we arrived at our destination completely dry. It was a wonderful trip, with beautiful views and the joy of having connected 20 friends using shortwave.
73 de IW0HK Andrea