He was on 433 first and then on 431 
I am the OP that made the trip on October 22, 2020 with my callsign DL1GKC/P. It is true that I discovered SOTA just a few weeks ago. For professional reasons, SOTA was on hold the past years. It is great to combine several hobbies (mountain walking, biking) with ham radio. Due to the changed SOTA regulations a few years ago, a lot of mountains/hills in my area where I live however do no longer qualify under the SOTA rules, but can still be activated under GMA rules.
That said, on that day I have activated two mountains, a SOTA mountain DM/RP-433 (Rehberg) and about 1.5 hour later a GMA mountain DA/RP-431 (Ebersberg). I also carefully plan my trips in advance to avoid errors, but nevertheless errors can still happen.
The confusion came when an op (I think it was S57S) contacted me during the second activation saying that the right reference number for my mountain would be DM/RP-431 instead of DA/RP-431. I had no internet connection to cross-check, but I should have been warned to use DM instead of DA when giving the reference number in the QSO, as the 2nd mountain was a GMA and not a SOTA activation! I have learned the hard way now.
Apparently that 2nd activation made its way to SW but with the wrong reference number (DM/RP-431 instead of DA/RP-431).
I also realized that one should be aware to use the iOS app PocketSOTA. The database cannot be updated without crashing the app. If one uses the map for nearby summits, even DM/RP-431 (Orensberg) is still a valid SOTA summit, as the app is from 2016. It is always best to check directly with the SOTA database whether a summit is still valid or not. Under GMA, Orensberg has the reference number DA/RP-449.
I enjoy being part of this community and appreciate all the man power that goes into our common hobby to maintain SOTA.
I agree that it should be part of the preparation to ensure that the SOTA summit is still valid. As long as the non-valid SOTA summits are still in the database, confusions or human errors can occur, especially if somebody is new to SOTA.
Hope this clarifies everything.
Good luck and stay healthy!
Vy 73,
Chris, DL1GKC
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