Sweden....

It was a good day on the bands yesterday....for a change!!  The last few days have been particularly bad after the double CME hit, but things are improving.  Hopefully today I will catch some DX on the CQ WPX Contest.

I had a first today, I was at Lemoine Park doing a POTA activation (as usual), and I was hunted by Thomas, SM3NRY, a Swedish station.  This is the very first time I have worked Sweden doing POTA.   Thomas gave me a 58 report, not too bad for 10w into a 15m Hamstick!

Propagation yesterday was: SFI=175, SN=90, A Index=7, K Index=1.

It was a quick activation, only 18 contacts were made, but it was great to be out in the sunshine and a park for even a short time.  Just enough to relax and enjoy things.

Here's the contact map:

Stay Safe Out There!

Back to VE-5141

With the bands being in such good shape today I couldn't resist getting out into a park again and doing some operating. It's so much better operating with no noise floor, than the constant S7 at home.

The weather was superb here as well, it got up to +10C, which after the cold we have had, is fantastic.....I think I finally thawed out!

The propagation was: SFI=181, SN=151, A Index=4, and the K Index=2.  I didn't hear any QSB today at all, even with the Bz sitting at -2.5. 

With all the stars aligning I went to Lemoine Point, VE-5141, and set up. It took me 40 minutes to get 25 SSB contacts in the log, using both 10m and 15m.  I put F4ILH, IK2BYY, SO5CAL, G0RQL, 2E0VRX, SP8BJU, DH4PSG, DK1RS, and OE4JHW, which absolutely made my day!  

The fact I'm doing this with my KX3 set at 10w, and only using various hamsticks as my antenna, is just amazing. This weekend, if I can get out, I'm going to try this with my 29' vertical wire, and see what I can do.

Here's todays contact map:

Be Well, and Stay Safe Out There!

10m was rocking!!

Yesterday, November 15th, I decided to do a mid-morning activation of VE-5141, Lemoine Point Conservation Area, a local to me, POTA spot.   

The weather, for this area, at this time of year, was spectacular.  Sunny, +7C (44.6F), and a deep blue sky.  Not a drop of rain or snow in sight.  It was just an absolutely beautiful day.

The day before during an activation of VE-5142, Parrott's Bay, I had great success on 10m, so today I decided to do the whole activation, if I could, on 10m.  Many of my activations have been done only on 40m, but I had never tried to do this on another band.

Luckily for me 10m was just alive with good signals.  First in the log was F4FTJ, and in rapid succession PU1JSV, 2E0VRX, OE4JHW, F4ILH, IK1GPG, EA1BUL, and F4HZR followed.  This was the first time I made POTA contacts with Brazil and Austria, that just made my day.  The Brazilian station was S9 +20 to me, just an outstanding signal.

The radio was my KX3 set at 10w.  The antenna of the day was a 10m Hamstick on the roof of my truck using a 5" mag-mount.  

The day's propagation was: SFI=124, SN=40, A Index=6 and the K Index=3.  There was no, to very little QSB, and the LIDS and deliberate QRM'ers stayed away for a change.

Hopefully if this run of good weather and decent propagation holds for a few more days, I can get out and do a lot more portable operating, because you know before long the snow will start to fly around here.

Here's the days contact map:

Keep Well, and Stay Safe Out There!

Parrott's Bay POTA Activation...

It was an absolutely beautiful day here in Kingston..but, we had high humidity which made things just a little bit uncomfortable. It was also 29C before the humidity was added on.

The propagation wasn't very good, again.  It's like a broken record these days, bad QRM and very noisy bands.  Todays propagation was: SFI=77, SN=14, A Index=5, and the K Index=1.  Hopefully the propagation Gods will wake up soon and let Cycle 25 start to take off.

After morning coffee I decided to drive to Parrott's Bay Conservation Area, about 15 minutes from my home QTH. It was fairly busy there with many trail walkers coming and going.  It is right on Lake Ontario, and therefore it get's a pretty good breeze, so it was a good place to operate from today in the heat.

The 40m band was the band of choice as it seemed to be operating better than the others.  It took me a little over 20 minutes to get 14 contacts in my log, which was good, because by then I needed another shower and some dry clothes.  The heat was incredible, and not at all comfortable.

All of my contacts were from the east today,  but given the fact I was using a 40m hamstick on the roof of my van with a 5" mag-mount, and 10w from my KX3, I'm pretty happy with the result.

I had 5 good Park to Park contacts which made things more interesting.  

These days I notice I have to make sure to read back the other stations callsign to them.  After all the years I spent flying Chinook helicopters in the Air Force, my hearing has suffered a great deal. So I have to make sure I have the correct call in my log.

I think I'm going to have to start wearing a headset all the time now, I hate to log an incorrect call, and I just refuse to do digital modes....I detest them.

Tomorrow, Sunday, I'm off to activate a local light house for the ILLW.  Let's hope the bands are in much better shape.

Stay safe out there!!

Well, life is on hold yet again...

So yesterday our Provincial Government announced another 30 day stay at home order, which means no POTA or SOTA activations from VE3 land.

Bugger!!!  It's 23C here today, under a cloudless, beautiful blue clear sky.  I even had todays POTA activation spot picked out and had done a drive by to check it out.   

It looks like the next 30 days will be spent as a hunter instead of doing the activations that were planned.  

I suppose in the long game it doesn't matter, the activation spots will still be there in a month, and hopefully then the propagation will have significantly improved over what we have had, or not had to be honest, over the past week.

Stay safe everyone, hopefully this pandemic will disappear sooner, rather than later!