Unless anything changes from 12th to 19th September Natalie M7NTD and I are on holiday in Anglesey.
Below is a photo of the front garden where we stay overlooking Holyhead Mountain Weather permitting there will be SOTA activations of GW/NW-040 Tal y Van, GW/NW-069 Holyhead Mountain and GW/NW-071 Mynydd Bodafon. There may be others and I will post Alerts for dates/times on SOTAwatch.
To save taking any HF gear I plan to operate 2M SSB with Natalie doing 2M FM afterwards. I need 4 QSO’s to qualify each summit and it would be nice to do this on 2M SSB. We will be using the Yaesu FT817ND and 3 element SB270 antenna. So if you have capabilities for this band/mode then all calls greatly appreciated.
Yes please, I always had 2m ssb on all my activities, shame that lately that mode is quiet in the UK. Even bigger shame is I am on a short break in Snowdonia that week and won’t have any radio gear with me, I also plan to do GW/NW-071 Mynydd Bodafon on Thursday 10th, but again shame no ssb. Good luck with your activations especially Tal Y Fan (lovely Summit) try beaming South on 2m ssb, I always hoped to get Don G0QRL, the stalwart Chaser from Devon 73 Tony
Hello Tony, I activated Tal y Van, Mynydd Bodafon and Holyhead Mountain on 2M FM when we went on holiday last year. We stayed at the same place we’re going next week. All are nice hills to do.
I was thinking the the Devon Beacon RQL would probably be about for a 2M SSB QSO. I have worked Don on 2M SSB before and I know that he’s reliable for a QSO if he’s about. It’s getting a further 3 QSO’s on 2M SSB to qualify the summits that’s of concern.
I managed to activate Tal y Fan for the first time on 2fm just before the iron curtain descended last March. A nice peak with no difficulties & an easy 7 points in the bonus season. I will watch out for any spots from you & hope to reply on my 818. Good luck & have a nice holiday! 73 John.
There will be plenty of 2m ssb opps out in GI and EI on the 13th as it’s the Irish counties 2m/70cms comp in the afternoon. Easy pickings from Holyhead mountain. Last year I worked several Welsh and English sotas on 70cms FM from the Mournes.
+1 for aiming towards LD. I’ll have the same setup and will manage to get you from here but will need to go up a bit as Black Coombe is in the way (I wish someone would move it ). I’ll keep an eye out for the alerts
We will certainly listen out for you on SSB Chris. We can work the IOA two from home on FM and Tal y Fan is never a problem. NW-040 and NW-071 are favourites of ours - we need to go again soon!
Have a great holiday.
73
Karen 2E0XYL and Neil 2E0TDX
Apologies no 2M SSB today. Natalie M7NTD fell in a bog/stream (again) and twisted her ankle. A discussion resulted in us plodding on. She made it to the bottom of the final scramble before sending me on my way to the summit. Quick 2M FM handheld activation with the Multi Function Dipole logged me 15 QSO’s including Summit to Summit contacts with Karen 2W0XYL/P on GW/NW-010 Moel Siabod, Dom M6KIO/P on G/SP-013 Gun, Andy MM0FMF/P on GM/SS-015 Ben Chonzie and John GW4ZPL/P on GW/NW-071 Mynydd Bodafon. Also logged a couple of EI stations in Dublin. So 4 SOTA activator points, 16 SOTA Chaser points and England, Scotland, Wales & Ireland worked. Now back at base resting.
I had a good chat to Robert GM4GUF after our QSO Chris and he said he thought conditions were up a little on 2m. Anyway, with a faulty 817 I was ever so pleased to get a GW<>GM S2S QSO in the log. I just used my VX170 + standard rubber duck, the new battery doing wonders!
The map says Ben Chonzie GM/SS-015 to Tal-y-fan GW/NW-040 is 358km or 211miles. I don’t know about you but that does make some amends for 817 throwing its teddies out of the pram.
Weather permitting there will be SOTA activations of GW/NW-040 Tal y Van, GW/NW-069 Holyhead Mountain and GW/NW-071 Mynydd Bodafon. There may be others and I will post Alerts for dates/times on SOTAwatch.
). I’ll keep an eye out for the alerts