Motivation
Today (December 6th 2022) is a bank holiday in Spain, due to the 44th anniversary of the establishment of the Spanish Constitution, core of the political system in EA.
Being free from work, this is a good oportunity for a SOTA activation. I checked the weather forecast and, despite today it is cold and wet, it will get even worse in the coming days, therefore I decide to do an activation.
I choose a local 4 pointer to grab the +3 winter bonus. Is it cold outside? Let’s get a flask with a very hot chicken soup to neutralize the low temperature in the summit!
The climb
I started parking near the village of Muniain. From this point it is a 2,2 km trek and 330 m elevation gain.
It was foggy and the plants and trees were wet with the night dew. Anyway, I grabbed my umbrella just in case and started walking.
Despite the weather, I still enjoyed the walk over the fallen leaves through the magic looking heart of this enchanted forest. Let me share some pics of the ascent with the bright autumn colour contrast:
The activation
The summit, indicated by a small hermitage, was also covered by a medium fog and I couldn’t see the landscape. I had a bit of precaution not to fall over the surrounding cliff.
Hopefully, it wasn’t windy at all and I setup my trapped EFHW inverted vee and my LNR LD-5 HF rig. Before starting and getting too concentrated with the radio I took some sip of my hot soup; I felt warmer and energized for the activation!
I ran on 14 MHz SSB and 10 MHz CW, and had a high SWR on 7 MHz so I avoided this one.
At a point the fog dissolved for some minutes and I could make these pictures:
I had plenty of calls and closed my log with 61 qso and 11 S2S. Thanks everybody!
I also explained a bit of ham radio to other mountaineers that showed up nearby.
Gastronomical tip of the day
To celebrate the nice day, before packing, I grabbed a Christmas dessert stick. This one is called “turron” and is distributed only for Christmas time.
The recipe includes mainly triturated almonds and honey. It is very sweet and provides a good amount of calories for the mountain.
This is eaten as a dessert after the main Christmas meals, cut in slices. I usually keep some tablets for the rest of the year. A similar dessert is also eaten in Portugal and Italy.
It seems that the Arabs brought it to Southern Europe,and there are references of this recipe in Spain from XV century onwards.
They bake also other variety with chocolate and some other flavours.
73 de Ignacio.
