Mt. Latxaga EA2/NV-056 by EA2IF/P on 03/04/2021

[EA2IF]

As it was widely announced in the following pre-planning thread,
My 56th birthday SOTA celebration - Activation Reports / Pre-Planning - SOTA Reflector

My birthday was in January and after a failed attempt in January, I got finally activated (complete too) this summit on April 3rd as my new way to SOTA-celebrate my birthdays.

The following map will give you an idea of where this summit is located, not far from the EA-F border and how the 65Km drive was to the small village of Orbara to the North-East of my QTH in Pamplona through curvy mountain roads.

The sky was very plumby on our way to Orbara and we found very low cloud when I got there at 8h15z. My SOTA-mate JAP arrived a few minutes later and we started our hike by 8h35. This was the route we followed and its elevation profile.

I had my GPS, but there was a clearly marked and easy to follow track. This was when we had just started our hike:

Shortly after, our bodies were getting warmth from the physical exercise and some of the outer layers got removed:

We were hiking through a beautiful forest:

At this point, we were getting closer to the summit:

And the summit was reached after a 1h50 hike. This is the mountaneers mailbox:

The previously removed outer layers were put back on.
It was 10h25z and I had alerted for a start at 11h00, so the timing was just perfect.
The setting up started by tieing my fishing rod to a beech tree trunk:

Setup was a sloper 14m long endfed wire hung from the top of a 7m long fishing rod to a 9:1 unun with a 6m long counterpoise wire extended on the ground and sleeves.
My rig was FT-817ND at 5W with a MFJ-941B antenna tuner.
Battery was LiFePo4 4S2P.
Everything was ready to start and we even had some nice sunshine passing through the clouds:

The activation started and ended with DX USA and it went like this:

• 14.056 KHz CW: 12 QSOs in 15 minutes, 1 of which was DX USA with Leslie @K4DY and one S2S with my dear friend Ignacio EA2BD/P from EA2/NV-059.

• 7.056 KHz CW: 12 QSOs in 18 minutes, 2 of which were S2S with Roger @F5LKW/P and Paul @HB9DST/P.

• 5.356 KHz CW: 4 QSOs in about 1/2 hour, 2 of which were S2S with @F4VPX/P and my dear old friend Javier EA2GM/P activating a new reference for the 1st time in EA1/AT land. In that 1/2 hour and after my S2S with F4VPX, I also spent some few minutes CQing on 21.056 and 28.056, but I didn’t hear any signal and never got a call back, as expected.

• 30m CW: 9 QSOs in 9 minutes.

• 14.056 KHz CW: 4 QSOs in 5 minutes, one of which was a DX USA with Rich @N4EX.

You can see me here when I was probably changing bands. Notice my lunch next to me on the ground still waiting to be eaten:

In this other picture I’m in QSO with Olaf @DL7CX/P:

This is the full log with 41 QSOs, 5 S2S and 2 DX USA after 1h40 on the air:

You can see it on the map:

The forest density on this summit probably took its toll in the form of less RF being sent out, thus the smaller number of QSOs for a Saturday activation:

After pack-up, I eat my lunch and started our descent and we enjoyed clear blue skies and beautiful landscapes like these:

We even found this beech tree seeming a mithological creature in the forest:

Thanks dear chasers for joining us in this birthday SOTA-celebration. I’ll be looking forward to copying you all again soon from a SOTA.

73,

Guru & JAP

[EA2BD]

What a lovely day and scenery Guru!
Glad you enjoyed and thanks also for my S2S complete with you.

Un abrazo
73 de Ignacio

[AC1Z]

@EA2IF

MFJ-941B

Great activation review! Thanks for sharing! Bob AC1Z

[F5JKK]

Super Guru
Je vous ai envoyé un “feliz cumpleaños” sur 40m mais c’est vrai que c’était déplacé…

les signaux étaient très forts Merci
73 Éric

[EA2IF]

Merci Éric pour les deux QSOs (40 et 60m) aussi que pour le “feliz cumpleaños” que j’ai bien copié avec plaisir.

Concernant l’erreur sur le log, je vois que l’heure de notre QSO sur 60m dans ton log collé sur ton post, n’est pas la même que dans mon log. J’ai 11h13 sur 40m et 11h55 sur 60m. Oui je rapelle maintenant que tu étais déplacé hors ma frequence quand j’étais en train de faire mon S2S avec F4VPX/P et j’ai pensé que tu étais peut être en QSO avec un autre activateur (?)
Voici mon log papier:

73 et à bientôt,

Guru

[F5JKK]

About mythological creature in the forest my sister find this one :

Ok Guru, ce n’est pas mon log mais celui de Filipe F4VPX SOTLAS le mien concorde avec lui ! Et le tiens…

mais ce n’est pas grave puisque nous sommes sur son Log

73

[F5LKW]

s2s ==> Nice pleasure to QSO you.
I share few pix from my part of paradise.
73 QRO

[M0WIV]

I miss Spain but hopefully we can return in 2022. The closest I’ve been to that area was in 2014 when I cycled along the Pyrenees on the Spanish side from Girona to Donastia/San Sebastian. This is the village of Abaurrepea/Abaurrea Baja, which isn’t to far from Mt Latxaga.

[EA2IF]

That is a very beautiful area and I enjoy it very much everytime I go there. I hope you’ll find a chance to come and activate SOTA there some time soon. I’ll be pleased to join you if you want a local companion.
73,

Guru
P.D. My rare family name is original from Navarra and someone with my same rare family name was present in Abaurrea according to a census made in the year 1366 (XIV century)

[M0WIV]

This reminded me of the account I published of our trip which I’m now reading again. I wasn’t fit enough at the start of the trip but was much better at the end. You have a lot of hills!

In the Foothills of the Spanish Pyrenees, by John Laidler

[EA2IF]

I’ve enjoyed reading your blog.
I found a few typos: the city of San Sebastian in Basque language is Donostia, rather than Donastia. Also Eugi is the correct spelling rather than Euji. The gi at the end are pronounced as your gi in given.

[EA2GM]

Hello Guru, it was a pleasure the s2s we achieved last Saturday. The conditions between our distance may not have been the best and the placement of my antenna was not optimal, but being able to decode such low cw signals is a great value.

It was a shame not being able to do s2s with Ignacio, EA2BD, but we will surely have other opportunities.

Ok Guru, I look forward to doing more s2s soon !!

[M0WIV]

Thank you, I’ve corrected those errors.

[N1AW]

Belated Happy Birthday to you, Guru. I’m sorry I missed you. Your signal is often very strong in Massachusetts in mid-morning, but on that day it was not audible here.

[EA2IF]

Thank you, Al,
I missed your call on my log.

@N1AW

on that day it was not audible here.

I put it down to not too good propagation conditions lately and all those trees around absorbing part of my RF.

Thanks for being there stalking.

73,

Guru

[RX9WT]

Guru, great report!
And, as usual, an excellent DX- result. I’m saddened that I didn’t see my callsign in your log.
73!
Vlad

[DL1CR]

That doesn’t fit here, but I was very happy to speak to you today, Guru. Unfortunately we rarely hear each other and then mostly only badly, but today it worked out quite well.

Best wishes, also retrospectively for your birthday and, above all, courage and confidence.

73 Chris

[EA2IF]

Hi Chris,
It was a pleasure for me to chase you today, although my copy wasn’t as good as I’d wished. Conditions on 40m rarely are good for me at chasing activators in central EU; most of the times I have quite a marginal copy with QSB and SSB only makes things even worse. A much better band is 30m and I’m looking forward to chasing you on 30m soon.
However, it wasn’t a bad chasing morning.

I know many of the contacts were made in the afternoon, but, before having our lunch, which today was at 13h00z (15h00 local), we usually call it the morning and the afternoon mentally starts for us after lunch. I know 15h00 is late for a lunch but it’s the time the kids get home after their school and we have lunch all together.

Keep up the good work at activating and also with your CW, as I recall you’ve written here that you are working on it.

73,

Guru