Tuesday night began with the 2m FMAC. From The Cloud G/SP-015 I made 46 FM QSOs in the 55 minutes with several contacts >200km and ODX 328km.
Remaining on summit for the 2m UKAC, I made 91 SSB QSOs which included 3 into OZ and 1 into IO87 (GM) - just with my 5 watts from the 817 and the trusty old battered, bruised, but recently refurbished 5-el SOTA Beam.
Good to catch Stuart G1ZAR/P on Shining Tor G/SP-004 and Lea M0XPO/P on Beacon Batch G/SC-003 for a couple of S2S.
Yesterday was a walk with Marianne and Liam. My mum had bought Marianne a little book of “Peak District Teashop Walks” for her birthday this year, and we’ve been working through them. Yesterday’s started and finished from the Penny Pot Cafe by Edale station, and I realised that from the point where we would start descending, it would be a mile each way walk along an even more spectacular stretch of the Kinder edges, into the AZ at Pym Chair. I only had my handheld with me and it seems Pym Chair is not a great take-off for 2m; the much more popular operating spot at the Kinder Low trig point is much better. I called CQ a few times, got nothing and resorted to a self-spot. Thank goodness Mr S2S himself - Martin 2E0BIA/P was on Shining Tor G/SP-004 and monitoring the spots - he came looking for me!
So just one QSO from Kinder Scout G/SP-001 but it was nice to activate it from a new spot, and using (almost) entirely paths I had not previously trodden despite 28 previous activations!
Getting home from this outing after 7.30pm BST, I was late getting out for the 2m FT8AC. By the time I was QRV on The Cloud G/SP-015, 45 minutes late! But I went on to make 27 contacts on 2m FT8, with DX in to PA (3), DL (2), EI (2) amongst others.
Let’s hope there’s more excitement to be had in the 6m UKAC tonight. I’ll be on G/SP-015 again for that - 1900 - 2130z.
Backpackers round 2 on Sunday morning - so I would hope for that too!
Mind you, it’s one of the earlier starts (0900z) - just what I don’t need after a Saturday night theatre show in Sunderland pretending to be part of Abba…
I shouldn’t have laughed, anyway - for one production at the Crescent Theatre they had the band in drag, I wore a long frock (I was b*****d if I was going to shave my legs), a blond wig and vivid red lipstick! I went through a reed a night for a fortnight, lipstick ruins them. That’s showbiz.
I’ll be working off a breakfast by doing something on the way home… for a complete and so a bash of backpackers sounds jolly. Last time I did a backpackers contest was with Brian G4ZRP when I lived in England, so before September 2000. I know I have an SB5 clone somewhere but cannot locate it. I do have a 14ele Tonna in several sheds (don’t ask why it’s not in one place).
Normally just a vertical is enough for mammoth fun on 2m FM on the LD weekends VM image is building.
re ABBA gig… does one of the girls wear the “cat dress” and does she have the figure for it?
Sorry, I couldn’t hear you, Tom. I was at my JO50 non-SOTA Tuesday night summit @ 980 m asl. I obviously was above this wonderful inversion layer. As there is no other decent summit for a Tuesday night around, I couldn’t do nothing but activate there and hope for tropo. In fact, G and Nordic were almost completely notched out. For the first time in years, I now regret that I activated in JO50 and wasn’t on DM/NS-135 JO42 440 m, from which having qso with you would have been much more likely.
It was great to catch you Tom. I had just packed up the HF kit and checked my phone one last time and there you were. As you know, I can’t resist a S2S!
For a Wednesday it was an exceptional S2S day, i even got Stephan F/HB9EAJ/P on three different summits for 30 points!
Today I was on Baugh Fell G/NP-012. On 2m FM I worked @GM0GAV in Perth at 242km with 8W to a slim jim. I could hear @MM0GLM/P on GM/SS-003 but he couldn’t hear me shouting “Summit to Summit” many times. I gave up and moved to 10m CW. I only had 2 QSOs but one was LW2DO in Argentina so that made up for it!
I could hear GM0GAV talking to you but couldn’t hear your end of the conversation today, but Jim MM0GLM was 59++ to me on East Craiglockart hill in Edinburgh. Strange conditions, apparently not bidirectional.
Andy
MM7MOX
