The forecast for today was not any good, but it was most likely the only free weekend day I will have in January. So we decided to go for a SOTA no matter what the WX conditions are. On Friday evening we decided we will go to the summit Lesný OK/KA-008, which we know very good as I have activated it many times. One of the extras on the very top is a small shelter which we might have made use of if it was raining.
We had a quick breakfast in the morning and than drove to a parking place in the middle of nowhere where we usually leave our car. The road was mostly covered in fresh snow from night, so I had to drive very slow and carefully. We parked our car and started a refreshing walk to the summit. I really enjoyed all the fresh snow, just a wilderness, silence and the snow. Not a single footstep from a man, but only few from wild rabbits and deer.
Fresh show
Once we reached the top, we quickly identified the trees we used last time to hang the antenna. The set up was really quick and I was looking forward to enjoy some 40m contacts. However at the moment when I wanted to power on the radio, two tourists reached the summit. We started to talk and during our conversation twenty other people, mostly children, also reached the summit. It turned out that the whole party was a scout group from local town. I was asked by their leader to give a talk about amateur radio hobby and about SOTA. So I tried to be as interesting as possible - maybe some day one of the childer becomes ham too!
Scout group with my inverted vee in background
After my talk, the children enjoyed fun in the snow while we discussed further technical aspects of amateur radio with their leaders. Later the group decided to continue in their trip, left the summit and I was finally free to enjoy the 40 meters. I turned on the radio, checked RRT and seen SQ9PND/P on SP/BZ-019 in the spots. I called him just once, adding the necessary “summit-to-summit” phrase and he instantly responded to my call. Starting an activation with S2S, that is how I like it! Then I found a free frequency and started calling CQ. I completed about 20 QSOs, one of them was OK2WA who could not believe me the WX report with snow and -1°C while he had 14°C in eastern part of OK.
My KN-Q7A 40m SSB 10W radio
Thanks to everyone who called me, I really enjoyed the activation!