Thanks Bas!!!!

Warning......this is not really about amateur radio.....

There has been a bit of a WW2 mystery in my family for a couple of years that we have been unable to figure out. But thanks to a fellow ham, we now have the answer!

The mystery was a picture that was sent to me when I was doing some research into my father's WW2 RAF Regiment Squadron. Here's what I knew: the picture was taken in August 1944, and it's somewhere in the Netherlands. Here's the picture:

What was interesting to me, when this photograph arrived is the fact my Dad is in the picture. He's the Corporal on the left side of the picture with Flying Officer Norman Page MC. My Dad was Norman Page's signaller, and served with him in No. 4 Flight, 2816 Squadron. The armoured car, and the other airmen, were with 2757 Squadron. Both of these Squadrons worked together in 1313 Wing of the RAF Regiment.

I knew from stories my Dad had told me that they were in the Netherlands searching for V2 rocket launch sites, Luftwaffe control centres, radar stations, and weapons stores.

As you can see from the picture there is no detail about where it was taken. The road sign gives us a few clues, but to somebody who's never been to the Netherlands, there's not much to go on.

I tried for quite a while to try and figure out using the distances shown on the road sign, all with no luck. In the end I had the bright idea to contact a fellow ham radio operator in the Netherlands, Bas, PE4BAS. I sent the picture to Bas and asked him if he had any idea where this might be.  The answer arrived within 10 minutes, it was Middelburg, The Netherlands. Now we knew!

By the time I had composed an email thanking Bas for the information, he had already sent another email, this time with a modern picture.  Here's the picture Bas sent:

You will notice the same two building in the background of both pictures. Absolute proof it is the town of Middelburg. 

So this mystery is now solved thanks to Bas. I can't thank him enough for helping with this, I would never have figured it out by myself. 

Middelburg, The Netherlands.

Bedankt voor je hulp, Bas. Ik waardeer het enorm!

Stay Safe Out There!

Three Parks, a suit, and a Wedding...

It was 6C (43F) on Sunday morning and I had an outdoor wedding to go to, the afternoon high was forecast to be 15C (59F). I really wasn't looking forward to going, I'm not a big fan of large, noisy, gatherings....they tend to set off my anxiety disorder, but it was my niece who was getting married, so I was going.

My wife and I were going in separate vehicles as she was spending the night and I was returning home that evening.  It was on my way out the door that I realized that I would be passing by my favourite POTA 3fer, Portland Bay Conservation Area. Hmmm.......could I pull it off?

The propagation numbers didn't look very good at all, and I knew there wouldn't be a lot of time to get the activation done. So off I went.

It takes an hour to get to Portland Bay, it's about half way to my wedding destination. I decided to try 40m as it looked the busiest on cw. The noise floor on 40m was around S6 but you could still hear a few signals getting through.

First up was Max K1SN, in Virginia. The furthest station worked was Tom KG1A in Florida. It took a little over thirty minutes to get the 10 stations in my log, and then it was off to the wedding. That's the first time I've ever done an activation in a suit and tie.....it's probably the last time as well as it was pretty uncomfortable.

I don't recommend telling your XYL you did this, you may get dragged out to more weddings as a punishment............did I mention the next wedding is next weekend?

Stay Safe Out There!! 

2026 Chillycon.....the Rest of the Story...

This was the 20th year we have held Chillycon, and my 17th time I've attended...and this year's Chillycon is a wrap.  

It was "cool". Thursday and Friday were great, but Saturday and Sunday morning were sitting at around 4 to 5 degrees, but we had a great time. The park was a lot quieter than it had been in the past few years, less screaming kids, and many empty sites which was a good thing for us. AND.....we had no rain at all.

We had 8 sites occupied and 10 hams there for the week. Saturday saw a pile of guys arrive for the day to operate, and we ended up having 18 for Pizza dinner that night. Don VE3MNE won the SSB DX Trophy with a contact into Namibia, and the CW trophy was won with a contact into Turkey by Tom VA2NW. The bands, however, were really not very good, very noisy and full of RF crashes. I did manage a CW contact into France and a SSB contact into Sweden, but that's all the DX I got in 5 days!!

I managed to do 10 POTA activations, only 1 new one, Hog's Back Park in Ottawa....a really nice place to operate from. I had also planned on operating from the Central Experimental Farm, but there was no parking and the place was a total construction site.

I also managed an activation at the Rideau Migratory Bird Sanctuary in Merrickville. What a change there! The location we used to go to, down the road by the picnic tables, is now fenced off and is being made into a huge dog park. If you go there to activate the only parking is now at the Library. I also activated the Block House NHS and found no issues parking there for a change.

Here's some photo's from the weekend....

My new tent, very comfortable and roomy.

The portable shack for the week.

The most important item....the portable bar!!

Stay Safe Out There!!

EFRW QRP antenna...

The EFRW QRP antenna long wire with 4:1 Balun that I received from Tuftein was tested this past weekend at Chillycon.

It was used for SSB and CW on several bands, both for hunting stations as well as calling CQ. No DX was worked with it, but stations in Texas and Georgia were.

The first thing I noticed was that the "Q" of the antenna was very narrow, making it necessary to retune the antenna every few kc. I don't have to do that with my Rybakov, so I'm at a bit of a loss why I have to do it with this EFRW.

The other thing I find very strange about this antenna is the fact it comes with a built in 4:1 unun. EFRW's normally use a 9:1 unun. So from that point of view it's a wee bit strange.

It's very well built, no doubt about that. But it certainly didn't perform for me as I was expecting it to. I believe this antenna should be redesigned and a 9:1 unun used instead of the 4:1, which I think would make it much better.

This antenna will be put away, and I will stick to using my Rybakov in the future.

Stay Safe Out There!!

Chillicon....this weekend!...

This coming weekend is the 20th running of the annual Chillycon event, the annual gathering of Eastern Ontario QRP'ers and POTAaholics.

As usual the event will be held at Rideau River Provincial Park, across the river from Kemptville.

Feel free to drop in on Saturday if you're in the neighborhood. There will be lots of different QRP radios in action as well as lots of antenna experimentation.  

I'm finally going to be able to test out the EFRW QRP antenna long wire with 4:1 Balun from Tuftein. I can't wait to see how it performs in the crappy propagation we have forecast for the weekend. Look for a report on that antenna next week.

Stay Safe Out There!!

Three Lost Events...

It seems every time I turn on the computer lately yet another thing has disappeared from the ham radio world. Last week it was CANParks, only 2 weeks after it had been started, it quietly closed down. CANParks, in those two weeks had gained 500 operators, all sending in logs, and enjoying the idea that anything called a "Park" could be assigned a park number and activated.

Yesterday I discovered that both QRP Afield and QRP to the Field had decided to stop their contests. To show you how quietly these shut down, QRP Afield didn't even post a comment on the fact there would be no further contests until after the 2025 event when hams sent in logs, only to be told there was no contest that year and wouldn't be any in the future. I was told the uploaded logs simply went into the garbage can.

QRP to the Field at least posted after the 2026 contest that this would be the last year the contest would be held. Low participation numbers was one of the excuses mentioned, as well as the proliferation of POTA and State/Provincial QSO Parties which now offered a QRP category.

I think the issue here is the fact that neither QRP Afield, or QRP to the Field, had any social media footprint. No Facebook, YouTube Channel, Twitter account, Instagram, or even a Groups.io site. How do you let hams know these niche contests exist if there is no way of getting the word out, other than a couple of very tired looking websites that maybe get updated every third year or so?

I'm equally surprised that no other QRP Club has stepped forward and offered to take over these two contests. With a good, solid, social media presence and a modern website, those two events could be made to be viable again. One only has to look at the way Winter Field Day took off after their modern website was built, and they added a Facebook site as well. 

Any Takers??

Stay Safe Out There!!

A Very Special Activation...

Today was a special activation day, one that has taken since 01 August 2021, to reach. There are now 1000 POTA activations, and 20,193 QSO's in the logbook....and that's all QRP - 10w, a KX3, and Hamsticks.

However, having stated it was a special day, I actually forgot about this until I was back home doing my log.

So thanks to Carl KD3CZE, from Hunt Valley, MD, who was number 10 in the log today and completed the activation. It's interesting that I see some of the same callsigns from my very first activation still appearing in my log today. By the way, the first contact on this journey was with Don, VE3MNE.

And, by shear coincidence, both activations, the first and number 1000, were both done at CA-5142, Parrott's Bay Conservation Area.

The bands today were a lot better than yesterday, the QSB and QRN were both absent this morning...which was excellent news! Propagation was a little bit better, today's numbers were: SFI=111, SN=86, A Index=6, and the K Index=1. 

So here's to another 1000 activations.....if I live that long. This time around they won't all be POTA activations. I'm adding CANParks, MOTA, and PARC's to my list of activations to do. More on those programs later in the week.

Parrott's Bay Creek

Stay Safe Out There!!

Are the bands Returning?...

It was off to the park today for another great morning of radio fun, after a week of absolutely crap weather and propagation. I was beginning to think we were already at the bottom of the cycle, instead of just starting our way to the bottom in a year or three.

Today's surprise contact was Thomas, SM3NRY, in Njurunda, Sweden. It's been awhile since I worked any European DX.

The band conditions were really not that good. Lots of deep QSB, and QRN. Stations just faded away as soon as they gave their callsign. It was not really a good day to be working QRP.

I worked mainly 20m and 40m SSB and CW. I was hoping to get a few contacts on 15m, but it never opened while I was on the air. 

Propagation this morning was: SFI=108, SN=37, A Index=6, and the K Index=1.

Just so people who work me know, as of this month I'm also uploading my logs to PARC and to CANParks, so check those sites for any hunter certificates you may earn working me.

Here's todays contact map:

Stay Safe Out There!!

Noisy Bands...

The weather was so good here today I had to visit three parks before I could find an empty parking spot! I must confess that I'll be very happy after the Labour Day long weekend - when the little people go back to school and spend their weekends playing baseball, or soccer, instead of running wildly around the local parks screaming at the top of their lungs, All this while mom and dad keep their noses buried in their phones.

I ended up at CA-5141, Lemoine Point Conservation Area. It was a mess of screaming little kids. It was actually a relief to finish the activation and get out of there before my headache got any worse. 

It took a little less than 45 minutes to put 18 contacts in the log. There was a great deal of QRM and QSB, and the bands were extremely noisy.

Radio was my KX3 set at 10w, with Hamsticks, and while all my contacts were made on 20m SSB or CW, I did try 40m, 17m, and 15m, with absolutely no luck at all. It was very surprising that 40m was as inactive as it was, normally it's a go to band.

Propagation was SFI=126, SN=77, A Index=8, and the K Index=1.

There will be no radio for the next 24 hours as we are expecting monsoon rains for that period.

Here's todays contact map:

Stay Safe Out There!

US Islands QSO Party...

Coming up on August 29th & 30th is this years' US Island QSO Party. It's always a good time chasing islands, and it's a nice time of year to be near the water.

A link to the rules and other information can be found HERE.

While only US Islands count, I'm lucky that a local island is also in the Frontenac Biosphere, and that location has activation numbers from at least three different park programs. That way I can chase islands and other parks...may as well make good use of my time outdoors before the snow decides to return.

Stay Safe Out There!