My family are visiting the wonderful OK-land of Czechia, camping at Camping Frymburk with the UK Tandem Club from Sat 22 Aug - Sat 29 Aug 2015. I am intending to activate at least one of the local summits. The closest are OK/JC-038 and OK/JC-028, on the other side of the lake. I would appreciate any advice on access and local customs. Is it easy to drive or cycle to fairly close to the summit and then walk? Are detailed maps available?
Alastair… looking forward to S2S with you… I’m there too!
I’m going out a day early and hope to do something in ON as we pass through and in DM/BM on the day the rally starts, before we arrive. While at the rally we’ll try and mix at least one tandem ride and an activation, plus the usual “rest day” activation by car. After the rally I’m staying on in the area for another week and will do some activations in OK/PL, OK/JC and OE/OO.
Hi Alastair,
you have chosen a beautiful part of our country indeed. I have spent a cycling holiday nearby myself a couple of years ago.
I do not know about OK/JC-038, but I have activated OK/JC-028 myself September 21, 2011. While you can drive by car up to Svaty Tomas, I recommend to go by bike using the forestry roads that are closed to motor vehicles. Both ways you first take a ferry across the Lipno lake.
Svaty Tomas is a small populated place with a church and some restaurants. The summit with a ruine of an old castle Vitkuv Kamen is only about 600 m horizontally and 50 m vertically from there.
There is an excellent map software at www.mapy.cz.
The area in question is here:
Hi Alastair,
I activated both theses sumits. The OK/JC-038 is an easy summit from the Frymburk by car or bike. The summit point is in forest. The OK/JC-028 is very nice place, as Ruda OK2QA wrote. The old castle Vitkuv Kamen in the Svaty Tomas village is an excellent look-out point with the small pub inside. There is also webcam: http://webcam.vimperk.org/preview/last/original/vitkuvkamen/last.jpg (view on Lipno Lake) and http://webcam.vimperk.org/preview/last/original/vitkuvkamenalpy/last.jpg (view to the Alps). If you will have time, I recommend to visit the OK/JC-028 sure.
The best online available map is in Ruda’s link. If you have an Android smartphone, there is also offline detailed map application Mapy.cz in the Android Google market.
73, Pavel OK1MCS
Can I extend a personal welcome to any local SOTA participants (DL/OK/OE?) to meet up at the Tandem Club Rally, either for a walk up a hill or for a drink one evening. Last year in France David M0YDH and I activated one small hill in Brittany in an evening.
It is usual for the Rally to have a “rest day” from the cycling programme on a Wednesday, so this is the most likely day I will do a car based SOTA activation that week. That will be Wednesday 26th August 2015. That date will be confirmed as the rest day closer to the event.
If you are interested in meeting up either reply here (which might be best so we can all see who is interested). Or, you can email me on my callsign at gmail.com
Thanks
Děkuji! (Hope Google Translate has done that properly)
Thought I’d jump in first… (probably) all you want to know.
There are usually 200+ people there from all around the world, mostly from UK, Holland, Germany, France, Belgium. A couple of years ago people had flown with their tandem from the West Coast of the USA. Dozens of tandems, triplets, child trailers… basically anything that carries multiple people and pedal powered. Usually some amazing sights!
It is a very good event for touring cyclists. I’ve been many times with our family. OK land is too far for us this year and my dear mother in law Monica has commanded us to turn up in southern Sweden by 1August for a significant wedding anniversary double party. I’ll be doing SOTA in Denmark the week before. Gerald and Alastair - the 2016 rally is back in the Netherlands iirc. We’ll meet up for joint activations then. I pray it’s not in the middle of a Polder!
73
David M0YDH
Thanks Gerald - would be great to do joint activation or swap S2S with each other. Sarah, 2E0DGM, has, in theory, a Czechia novice licence, except Dave (Cameron - not Holman!!) & predecessors had more important things to do than sign appropriate bit of CEPT but she can operate under the callsign of a radio club provided she is supervised by a full licence holder with a HAREC certificate so hopefully I will be able to sort out the technicalities for her to transmit under my supervision. Many thanks to the Czechia radio authority & Telford & Districts Amateur Radio Club for advising me on this.
See you there! We are driving to Dover 10pm Thu 20 Aug for 4am sailing to Dunkerque on Fri 21 Aug. We are staying in Heidelberg Fri pm and arriving Sat pm.
We depart Sat 29 Aug and hope to stay in Echternach Sat 29 Aug & Sun 30 Aug and then sail back to Dover on Mon 31 Aug.
Thank you very much Pavel - the information is much appreciated. It is still light here in Wolverhampton, UK (19:34 UTC) but your webcams are in darkness. I’m sure they display fantastic views in daylight (I’ll have a look tomorrow) and I’m looking forward to visiting your country.
Although it is legal under the intermediate licence to operate under supervision of a full licence holder or by a radio club, you are NOT allowed to enter SOTA contacts made under supervision of another radio amateur under your own account on the SOTA Database. If Sarah 2E0DGM activates a Czech SOTA summit under your supervision, the contacts would go to you, not her and likewise if she operated under a club callsign where the contacts would go the the club and not her. You can activate SOTA summits with club callsigns and allocate them to yourself, but only if can you provide your own supervision, ie being a full licence holder.
