Last Friday me and the XYL drove down to Devon to visit my family and decided we would go for a walk on Dartmoor. Naturally the High Willhays made sense as it’s also a SOTA summit.
In short the activation was nasty, visibility was poor and winds were very strong, by the time we got to Yes Tor we were cold and spirits were low so we decided we would not walk on to High Willhays. But the XYL gave me the reluctant go ahead to set the equipment up and I think this is still a valid activation point only being 2m lower than the Willhays, to be honest we couldn’t even see the High Willhays due to the rubbish visibility.
On the Yes Tor summit the winds were strong enough to blow you off your feet, so we hid behind a rock a little lower. I made a short video which shows the conditions and me almost getting blown off the trigpoint (apologies for the bad audio… too much wind!):
In total I made 6 QSO’s in a grand total of 4 minutes of operating on 40m. Thanks to @G0HRT, @M0IBC@G0RQL, @G4WSB, @M6KVJ and @G6ODU. The XYL held onto the fishing pole holding up the antenna during the QSO’s, as it kept collapsing when it was guyed.
Apologies to other chasers for the short activation but given the conditions on the summit we decided it best to descend as quickly as possible!
The walk back was really tough as visibility was down to 10m and we had lost all our visual references, we eventually found a track and stuck to this until we could ascertain exactly where we were on the map, based on the junctions along the path. To say we were happy to be back at the car would be an understatement and we learnt that walking in the Moors is not to be taken lightly and preparation is key.
My XYL has vowed never to join me on another SOTA activation and to be honest based on this experience I don’t blame her!
A nice picture we shot on arrival, the visibility quickly deteriorated:
Oh heck…
From the England Association Handbook, “Summit operation criteria Operation must be within 25m vertically of the summit”,
From the General Rules, “4. The Operating Position must be within the permitted Vertical Distance of the Summit, as defined in Rule 3.5. The terrain between the operating position and the actual Summit
must not fall below the permitted Vertical Distance.”
If the Col is at 593m then Yes Tor isn’t in the Activation Zone.
My map doesn’t show a spot height at the Col so I can’t verify Martyn’s comment.
I was looking at that too.
I think it’s a bit of a grey area and could go either way.
Because the 5 meter contours are missing for reasons only known to the OS, then without a proper survey we are not really to know.
I’ve done some cartography for you to ensure it’s a valid activation
For information, my comment was based on the height model in ViewRanger, which I believe is OS data, though I’m not sure how accurate it is.
The current OS digital map shows a spot height of 595m at SX 57980 89943, which is about 20m west of the path. Whether this is intended as an indication of the col is anybody’s guess.
It’s odd that the 595m contour is truncated at the grid line on the 1:25000 map - must be two different editions. However by eye, it’s hard to imagine that contour encompassing both YT and HW, and if that doesn’t, then 596 certainly doesn’t.
On the other hand, contours are not accurately surveyed anyway, so it’s hard to be absolutely certain from the map.
According to hill-bagging.co.uk, Yes Tor has a prominence of 24m, which places its key col 26m below High Willhays.
Ummmm, I was hoping it would be a bit more clear cut than this. From my beginners perspective there only seemed to be a 2m height difference between the summit on Yes Tor and the one on High Willhays so thought this was within the 25m vertical ascent rule?
Either way there was no way we were going to press on to the High Willhays that day, the conditions were hideous.
That is necessary but not sufficient. If you think about it, that fact is true of any number of places throughout the country.
The requirement is that there must exist a path on the ground between summit and activation point (not necessarily in a straight line) which does not drop by more than 25m from the summit. Here I mean path in the mathematical sense of a line on a surface, not necessarily a physical path that you can walk on.
In this case, there is a ridge between High Willhays and Yes Tor. What matters is the minimum descent on that ridge between HW and YT. If you can get from HW to YT without dropping more than 25m below HW, then YT is a valid activation point. If not, it isn’t.
It’s a very close thing, but on the face of it the highest route between them seems to drop by at least 26m, possibly a little more.
The elevation profile provided with Memory Map (which cannot be regarded as 100% reliable) suggests that there is a line to the west of the footpath which does not drop below 595m i.e. I can run the cursor between the 600m contours without seeing a value under 595m so it is clearly a very close thing. Strangely the OS do have contours at 5m intervals above SX 58000 90000 but not below.
Jim
I tend to agree with several other commentators. Yes Tor is not in the AZ of High Willhays even though it is a close miss. Further notes are shown on the summit reference page for G/DC001 by M1EYP/M3EYP, and G4OBK. When I climbed High Willhays it was from the rather beautiful Meldon Reservoir and a somewhat steep zigzag initial climb on a clear day. It would be easy to think the two summits were together if you could see them both but on a misty day, and it often is on Dartmoor, it can be dis-orientating.
Sorry I have not counted the Chaser points this time but I do look forward to working your station again the next time you climb it.
For other prospective SOTA activators to this one, it is worth reading the notes by G4ERP on how to contact MOD for safe access as in places I believe it is used as a military range.
General consensus seems to be that I was not within the activation zone for the High Willhays, despite acting with the best of intentions. So unless I’m told otherwise I’m assuming the points don’t stand. As such I’ve deleted my log for this activation, apologies to the chasers involved.
Despite this all in all being a disastrous activation, I’ve learnt a lot of good lessons. Thanks to the helpful people who reached out with advice.
I will activate DC-001 on future visits to Devon and next time I’ll (hopefully) make it to the Hill Willhays summit.
No need to apologise James, an honest mistake. Doing the “right thing” earns you lots of respect from everyone involved. Like Adrian, hopefully your next activation will be good one.
p.s. maybe you shouldn’t tell the xyl you dragged her up a hill in awful weather for no points even if she has said she won’t being doing another with you!
