It's That Day Again...

Today I complete my 69th trip around the sun, and while it does tend to suck getting old, I have to say that it definitely beats the alternative. As a way of celebrating I decided to return, as I did last year, to Lemoine Point, CA-5141, and do another POTA activation - my 126th at that location.

The propagation numbers looked pretty good today, and I thought I would do well on 10m as I have done the last few times I'm been at the park. The numbers were: SFI=210, SN=117, A Index=7, and the K Index=3. The Bz was sitting at 0.0, the QSB was particularly bad, but I've operated with a lot worse than that.

I spent a lot of my time during the activation today thinking of my Dad, VE7CVQ (SK), and the fact that I'm now two years older than he was when he passed away, which is a scary thing. But I was really thinking about what he would think of the modern craze of portable operating....POTA, SOTA, BOTA, WWFF, etc. Dad was a CW rag chewer, a 50 word a minute guy, and had been since he was a high speed morse operator during WW2. If I was really being honest, I don't think he would think much of it. On the positive side, he would be happy with the up-tick of CW use during these portable activations.

I started today on 10m SSB, but I only managed to make 3 contacts before I switched to 40m. There were lots of comments about deep QSB on my signal, and my signal reports reflected that fact. While the number of contacts were down today, it was still good to get out of the house and play radio.

Here's todays contacts map:

Stay Safe Out There!!