We had a good time. The weather wan't too bad, a little light rain, but it stayed up at about +2C all weekend. Of course that meant melting snow and mud, but we survived that.
The propagation could have been much better, but it was what it was. On Saturday it was: SFI=157, SN=52, A Index=6, and the K Index=0. On Sunday it was SFI=148, SN=48, A Index=5, and the K Index=2. Our dear Sun had obviously decided not to be too cooperative for the event. We had lots of bad QSB as well, one minute a signal was S9+, and the next second they were gone, just disappeared as if they had never been there.
I used my 17' collapsible whip with my mag-mount on the roof of the truck as my main antenna for the weekend, and it worked great on Saturday......not so much on Sunday morning though for some reason. On Sunday morning Don VE3MNE, kept breaking through and over loading the front end of my KX3, he was on 15m and I was still working 20m, I guess we're going to have to buy some band filters and sort all that out.
We only made about 100 contacts between us, but we had a good time. We worked SSB and CW....except instead of using the club call, VE3UCC, I stupidly forgot and used my own call when I switched over to CW, so I have to try and sort out that mess. We live and learn I guess.
The main reason I wanted to do WFD this year was to see if the gear I'm taking on my road trip this year worked as advertised, and I think it's ready, there may be a few more little tweaks, but nothing major as it is really good to go now.
Here's a few pictures of the event:
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| Jim, VE3ULC, chasing WFD stations. |
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| Getting ready to shoot some antenna lines in the trees. |
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| Don, VE3MNE, chasing Hawaii on 15m. |
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| Our home for the weekend. |
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