Richard G4ERP reached the status of ‘Mountain Goat’ today (10th Feb) whilst activating his local summit of Cleeve Hill (G/CE-001).
With a total of 239 activations (146 of them unique) now under his belt at an average of 4.18 points per expedition, Richard became the 35th person in the world to reach Mountain Goat status.
Richard’s first SOTA Activation was on 10th December 2005 (also Cleeve Hill), which means he managed to reach MG status in 26 months.
Richard has also recently reached the status of Slack Sloth by reaching the 1,000 chaser point mark with an average of 2.94 per Expedition (340 Summits), whilst this was technically achieved in late November 2007, Richard chose not to celebrate this milestone until today.
Richard is understood to have celebrated both these achievements with his partner Jill and a glass of bubbly at the summit.
Fine Business! Well done Richard, its been a pleasure to work you so many times from the shack and on the hill. Many congratulations on the double milestone.
I would like to echo Stewart’s congratulations with my own Richard. You were my first SOTA QSO which was also my first SOTA S2S (Edmunds Tump to Walbury Hill). I have also had the pleasure of undertaking a Joint Activation with you when we achieved our shared ambition of qualifying the summits on 144MHz by me “piggy-backing” your first 4 contacts, even though this meant that you had to line up the contacts for me on our second summit due to my delayed arrival!
Many thanks for the help and advice over the past year and more. Thanks also for “taking up arms” by activating 432MHz SSB, a task which would have been daunting had it been down to just myself flying the flag.
Many congratulations on your double achievement, - and what a beautiful
day for you both to enjoy your champers on Cleeve Common!! A pleasure
to speak to you as always, and I look forward to the next one.
Heartfelt congratulations on your superb double achievement Richard.
You Sir are a true gentleman and it has been a great pleasure to join you on your journey to this wonderful double achievement.
Well done.
[13:32:57] 2E0HJD Mick Dixon says: mike can you post this on ric`s thread on my behalf.
[13:32:27] 2E0HJD Mick Dixon says: Congratulations Richard very well done, glad you made it on both achievements it`s been a pleasure to work you in the past and especialy today, well done.
Thanks, everyone. Your comments are very much appreciated - as has been your friendship and support over the last 26 months.
SOTA is very special and I think that’s partly because it’s not easy - but then it’s not supposed to be easy. The mutual understanding that results from our experiences engenders respect amongst members of the community.
This weekend coudn’t have been a better finale (actually, it’s only the beginning). Waun Fach was stunning in the sunshine - as was the walk from home up my local Cleeve Hill yesterday.
I’m afraid I’m going to bore you with a few words and photos some time in the next couple of days when Goatdom has sunk in but in the meantime I just want to thank everyone for their kind words.
'ERP
ps I hope things didn’t sound too disjointed on-air yesterday. It was a very small bottle of Moet et Chandon but it certainly packed a punch!