Hi everybody,
I just returned from my SOTA weekend in the Bavarian Forest. Thanks to all chasers to contact me on 15m - a rather unusual band for SOTA. I activated 4 summits sucessfully and I want to share with you how it actually went. I did not record any video or audio because I am still a SOTA newbie and I was so much consumed with the event itself.
Part 1:
2013-04-26 DM/BM-046 (“Kleiner Arber”)
Conditions have been quite windy but warm with 20 degC or 68 degF. It was an approx 370m climb and the last 200m to the summit have been covered with lots and lots of snow, melting snow and ice. It felt very strange to hike through it in summer-like air. I actually missed some snowshoes at this point.
It was physically very demanding to cross this white belt. Several times I broke into the snow with the full length of my leg. Unfortunately under the snow a huge amount of snowmelt was flowing - you could here the streams but not see them. So when I finally arrived at the peak my shoes were wet and I needed a break. The peak itself was an interesting scenery - very dry and most of the trees were broken because of a strong storm some years ago.
I found a nice and calm shelter behind a rock and changed some of my clothes. After some rest I installed my fishing rod antenna right on this rock and spotted my location using the UK SMS gateway. As usual on 15m no pileup but solid contribution gave me the necessary number of contacts for this summit.
I worked Portugal, Spain, UK and Russia.
To hike downhill I put some thin gloves into my boots to keep my feet as dry as possible. This worked very well and I arrived at my car close before sunset. This activation was my first > 1000m summit, very nice and very demanding. It took me 2,5hrs up and 1hr down.
Thanks and all the best 73s
Stefan DO7KX/P
So why the title “No Video but ants” … see my next report about the activation of DM/BM295 “Abendberg” (which could be translated as “Evening Mountain”). There you will get the explanation.