TLDR; 3 Summits and a few pota parks on a recent trip to Manchester.
Shining Gun Cloud
After arriving at the hotel near Manchester Airport, I pick up a Toyota Aygo for my little rove. I set off towards Macclesfield and soon found myself gently climbing the rolling hills of the Peak District. I was told these roads are some of the most dangerous in the UK and I can understand why as they sweep sharply upward with plenty of turns and switch backs.
Having done a Google Maps recce of the area for parking and access I headed to a layby between a restaurant and the Cat & Fiddle pub. Here there is enough room for about 4 cars. The track leads off to the west, it’s an easy climb and the track is easily identifiable. At the summit of Shining Tor G/SP-004 I took the obligatory Trig point photo and moved to set up on a rock close to the edge of the cliff.
I try to bring a handheld with me on activations but normally use HF. Having read a few reports on the SOTA reflector this summit was known for some particularly good VHF take off. From recommendations from other users, I used an RH-770 antenna on my Yaesu FT2D. First call was Jake G6SEY soon followed by a S2S with John GW0MHF/P in Wales. A very interesting call came in next from Kev G0TPZ/AM who was flying to the south of me at 2500ft. Height is definitely an advantage here; I’m normally the instigator of /AM calls as A65EI/AM when I’m in work but this was a first for me to receive this type of QSO. Number 4 to validate the summit was Ian G7ADF who was a stalwart of the day and called me on each of the day’s summits. It took about 11 minutes in all for the 4 QSO’s proving the reflector comments correct. The summit is also with the POTA parks Shining Tor Hillside Reserve GB-6042 and Peak District National Park GB-0048, the POTA website mentions 3 parks but I couldn’t confirm the boundaries of all parks. I continued with 2m to activate the Parks with a total of 10 QSO’s. Knowing I had more Summits to visit I didn’t hang around too long but experimented with 70cm’s. Reports were that the reception was good but I found there to be a lot of digital interference, perhaps it would be worth investing in a band pass filter?
I had mentioned to some of the callers that I was looking forward to having a bite to eat at the Cat & Fiddle, so I set off for there once off the hill. Unfortunately, it was closed! Enroute to Gun I stopped at a small cafe by the side of the road called Flash Bar Stores, I can recommend the Peak Pasty that they have.
Next up was G/SP-013 Gun, this is an easy 1 pointer with ample parking nearby, the activation zone is quite large as the route to the Trig point is a shallow climb. In fact, during one QSO from Shining Tor it was mentioned that I wouldn’t have to go too far within the gate to be in the activation zone! I set up on the Trig point itself, it was pretty windy here so I wrapped a bungee cord around the Trig point and clipped the radio to it and sat in some shelter with the hand mic. It took only 6 minutes to get the 4 QSO’s but again it’s part of a POTA park so was agreed for 10. After 20 minutes in total and a with only 7 in the log I broke out the Xiegu X6100 and an EFHW in Inverted L configuration for a little bit of FT8 on 40m. From Gun it is easy to see Cloud only 4 miles away. Checking the time, I reckoned I had enough time left for one more summit.
The drive to Cloud G/SP-015 was short, the road to it is quite narrow and I missed the small car park first time around. There is space for maybe 3 cars maximum. The walk up is quite pleasant with only a few steep steps to negotiate before it flattens out into a marked path leading to the summit. There are two markers at the top, one of which has a compass rose with lines marking such points as John O Groats and Lands’ End with their respective distances. There is one pointing back towards Gun at 4 miles distance. Cloud is a little exposed to wind and sun and I needed to find a less windy spot to operate, there is plenty of rocky nooks to activate from. 2m dried up quickly, a combination of the time of day - nearly 5pm so I think a few people were finishing up work or maybe just away from their radios. Steven 2W0JYN and Ian G7ADF responded to my calls on the third summit of the day there was also Chris M9LQA who was on the road from Wales in his truck. I also had a very enjoyable QSO with Dave M7HAE who had home brewed 2 antennas that we got to test on both 2m and 70cm’s. To finish off the POTA side of the activation I switched to HF on 40m and 20m. I caught Denis EI6IF in a 2fer in Ireland, he recognised my voice but not the callsign (I normally activate elsewhere with my HAREC call EI3JMB < I hope you have been keeping up with all my callsigns HiHi >.
On 20m I caught an Italian station Rik IU1PZC in his POTA park.
That wrapped up a quite full day of SOTA and POTA. In total I activated 3 summits and 4 parks with the majority on vhf alone, somewhat of a challenge I had set myself to do at some stage. I’m newish to SOTA and am enjoying the slower pace and comradery of a little bit of rag chewing within the community. As always there were lessons learned, I think if I had more time available and with a plan for less summits each would have been easy to activate on VHF alone. The RH-770 is a fine antenna but I need to get to the bottom of the 70cm interference, maybe the band pass filter is the solution.
