Yesterday - Saturday 15th March 2025 - Jimmy M0HGY invited me out for the last day of the winter bonus. We tend to do this about this time every year, but usually it’s only Jimmy collecting points, as I would normally have already done them since New Year.
However, I’d not yet been up Shining Tor G/SP-004 in 2025, and my two attempts to activate Gun G/SP-013 did not yield 4 QSOs! So there would be six points on offer for me as well as the seven for Jimmy.
Anyway, a great day on the hills. Decent weather albeit vey chilly on Shining Tor. Our flask of Heinz Chicken Noodle soup was therefore welcome there.
Despite that, we were hungry after descent, so called in at Flash Bar Stores for a snack. The gastronomy would continue after The Cloud G/SP-015 with a superb three course meal at The Harrington Arms, Gawsworth!
I used the @MW0SAW Excalibur antenna, giving me 40m, 20m, 15m and 10m without a tuner for HF CW and SSB action. I also sneaked through a 30m S2S QSOs and even one one on 60m on this antenna!
Jimmy had his SOTAbeams MFD for 2m, and my handheld and rubber duck was used for some 70cm S2S.
We shouted each other whenever S2S opportunities arose and we would quickly “hot desk” our positions!
Between us we made 177 QSOs across the day, which included 49 summit-to-summit contacts. Not a bad haul!
I first activated these summits for SOTA as a 32 year old. The same age as Jimmy M0HGY is now. I guess we’ve been SOTAing for a generation then!
