It was a dark and blustery night...

I got off work at 4:00PM yesterday, grabbed my gear and drove to K-4183 Atterbury Fish and Wildlife Area, and was on the air by 4:50PM.  It was about 60F degrees but a bit windy.  I setup at Stone Arch lake this time, operating from inside my 2006 Trailblazer...it's very cramped but I need to figure out a way to do this so I can keep activating in the winter time.  

My run last night was cut short when the winds caused my Eagle One to collapse, plus since we are no longer on daylight savings time it was getting dark by 5:30PM. I manage to operate about 28 minutes before the mast came down and I decided to pack it in. I did make 20 regular contacts and two Park to Park contacts.  I operated on 7065 Khz the whole time I was on the air.  

I was also getting some very strong QRM, voices and I am pretty sure they were coming from the Camp Atterbury military base just south of me.  So between dealing with QRM, the wind, and cramped quarters in the truck, I was ready go. 

Anyway, here's my QSO map from last night, 40m was working well. I was running the K2 at 10w. 

And here is the Reverse Beacon Network report for my last 15 or so minutes on the air. 

So far I have never had a bad activation, any time I get to go play radio like it's field day, I am one happy camper.  Looking forward to maybe getting back out there this weekend.  This was my tenth activation of K-4183.  

Best 73

de KB9BVN

Morning in November - POTA!

 

I woke up this morning and looked outside, it's the 7th of November, the pandemic is still here, the election is a mess, and I decided that what I needed was a trip to the closest POTA Park and some RF therapy.  What a beautiful morning, it was 47F in the Hoosier Heartland when I left the house.  By 10:20AM I was at the location and setup and ready to roll.  Temperature had started rising and it was 55F when I got started. 

I was at K-4183 again, Atterbury Fish and Wildlife is right next to the military camp called Camp Atterbury. This morning I was treated to the joyous chirping of birds, artillery practice a couple miles away, and full auto machine gun fire at the Army range about a mile up the road.  The rumblings were not too loud because of the distance but they went on the whole time I was there.  Good to know they are keeping in practice! 

Started out on 15m at 21040 Khz, hung there for about 20 mins calling CQ POTA and never heard a peep, so I switched to 40m, heard lots of signals, and tuned to 7065 Khz and started calling there.  It did not take long to have 10 contacts in the book, like less than 15 minutes.  I pretty much stayed on 40m the whole time I was there with one exception, I worked WI2X on 10.125 Mhz for a Park 2 Park contact. 

My station this morning was my Elecraft K2 at 10w, an LDG autotuner, Parkwood Paddles I bought from Richard WB9LPU about 20 years ago, and a Imuto Brand Lithium something battery pack from China via Amazon.  That battery can run my CPAP machine for 16 hours...so I take it camping!  Antenna was my ever trusty Eagle One vertical mounted to my trailer hitch. When I am in the field I log to paper and then enter it into N3FJP logger on my laptop at home.  

For the last half of my operating, the Reverse Beacon Network had me with great signals all over the US, which explains my contacts in California (W6OUL) and Utah (KN7D) today.  It is SO GREAT to see the SFI over 90 again...it's been awhile!  Take at look here:

SSN:35 SFI:94 A:8 K:2 

So by the time my session was finished at about 11:40AM EST, I had logged 37 contacts, and was getting hits from hunters from all over the US/Canada.  I did not hear any Europeans today or any other DX. 

The one red one was a SSB park to park on 40m.  All in all I had 37 contacts, with six of them being Park to Park contacts.  A great way to spend a Saturday morning in the beautiful fall weather. 

Best 73 

de KB9BVN