Since quite a few weeks ago, a new amateur has started doing SOTA activation in EA2/NV.
His name is Pablo, EA2EWC, and he got his ham licence receintly.
Although very new to the hobby he is doing well. Equipped with a VHF handheld so far, he has activated succesfully several SOTA since March this year.
I chased him several times and we agreed on a joint activation today.
- Activation date: April 24th 2021
- Mt Dulanz EA2/NV-052
A last view from my window before leaving home showed a promising day:
After a 1h 15 min walk we arrived in the summit and installed a double loop array antenna for VHF and also my HF system so that he could hear EU chasers on shortwave. It was really windy and we had to hide behind a stone wall next the summit. The aerials were pushed hard but the poles did the deal.
To my surprise, Pablo just logged 2 stations, and couldn’t do anymore although he tried hard. These days restrictions on EA2 area are severe and movement in neighbor regions are very limited, thus having a lack of activators around us. A pity he couldn’t log any S2S as in his previous activation.
Concerning HF, I did a brief activation, running on 14 SSB and 7 CW. I had some issues with my paddle; sorry for some dificulties in my keying, while running. I used an external keyer along and seems it produced some missing characters…
Worried about the tiny log Pablo had, I tuned 7 MHz SSB and he started calling. I was astonished nobody replied him. Poor band conditions? Unfortunatelly we were running out of time, and the weather wasn’t that nice, so we called it a day and packed.
Thanks also to the S2S I logged today: SQ9BQW Wojciech, SP9MA jarek, EC2AG Antonio and F5LKW Roger.
All in all a nice walk in the countryside, with bright green spring colors.
73 de Ignacio
