DD5LP/P – October 17th 2026 – Activation of SOTA DL/AM-001 Höher Peißenberg for the UK/EU<->VK/ZL S2S event. (also POTA 3-fer POTA DE-0594 Münchner Jakobsweg, DE-0595 Sudostbayern Jakobsweg & DE-0797 König Ludwigweg location).

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Preparation:

This activation on Höher Peißenberg was prepared for with a “dummy run” on September 19th (see the previous blog report) and as that went without any major incident, the same combination of radio and antenna would be used this time, with the exception that the radial wires on the driven element had been upgraded to be all silicon rubber covered wires, so avoiding the tangling up that can occur (this upgrade was well worth the small effort needed).

As a start of 7 am saturday was planned, the radio gear, all packed into/onto my 40L rucksack, was loaded into my car, Friday evening.

The Activation

On the morning of the activation, the first thing I saw was an email from Andrew VK1DA telling all that radio conditions had taken a dive and contacts would likely be a challenge. having got up so early and while the rain was holing off, i decided to go to the summit in any case and try.

the last time I was at this summit, the main road in Hohen Peissenberg under the summit was completely closed for road works. i check the government website which told me the works needed another 7 to 10 days for completion (there was nothing in Google maps, so i informed them as well). I therefore planned a slightly longer route going into Peissenberg itself and then coming out to approach Hohen Peissenberg from the other siide. all set and I was actually ready to leave before 7 am and so set off, heading for my new route but relying upon Google maps to take me from Peissenberg, the rest of the way. All seemed fine to start with until, after touching the side of Peissenberg, Google instructed me to turn right, which seemed OK at the time however, what Google was actually doing was taking me back onto my old route and bringing me to the same road works which i had planned to avoid. the “official” diversion adds a good 10 minutes to the journey so I took the same “local traffic only” back road I had used last time on my return journey – after all this was still early morning. Somewhat annoyed with myself for not printing out my alternative route (which I took on my home journey), I arrived at the summit, parked and went to set up. It was around 2°C at the time and never got over 7°C. On arrival, as the sun had just started to rise, there was a lovely red sky, which unfortunately my smartphone camera could not catch correctly. Beautiful but also a warning of rain on its way later in the day.

Hohenpeißenberg – 17.10.26 07:30 – foto-webcam.eu

The 20m band was relatively quiet to start with, with just the usual Russian and Italian power stations on the band but then while tuning around, I happened onto a ZL station ZL1KBA with a lovely clear signal, chatting to a friend. I waited until he finished as I thought a start of the day with a ZL station in the log would not be a bad start. But, when I released the PTT from calling him, there was a “wall-of-noise” the rest of Europe had also found him. there was no chance so i continued to tune and found a similarly clear VK4EEC, also just finishing a local Queensland chat, but again, it seems hundreds of other ops were tuning around the same as I, and again despite going back and trying a few times and hearing my call sign at one point, I could not break the pile-up.

i tried a couple of times, to spot myself and call CQ SOTA but, as so often happens, as the band opens a once clear frequency is no longer clear with someone calling a kc or two away from me or right on top, so the majority of my contacts were going to posted frequencies of other SOTA activators and listening, in the hope of hearing them and then giving them a call. As it turned out from other activators, it seems my 20w SSB and the phased vertical array did fairly well and I eneded up, as you will see from the log and map below, with 3 S2S contacts into VK, 2 in Europe and a couple of other good contacts as well.

The new website from Duca YT3MD ( http://www.yt3md.com/ ) is great to feed an ADI log file into, to see how you did. I also added the flag to say which contacts were long path from Germany over the Americas and down into Australia and the website shows that route and distance correctly. A really useful website, which I can only recommend highly.

All in all the exercise was successful, as far as it could be with the radio conditions and good preparation for the EU-NA S2S event on November 7th, when it will no doubt be a lot colder, but at least that will be an afternoon activation.

Photos:

  • View of me setting up from the nearby webcam
  • Red sky in the morning – sailors’ warning!
  • The view around the site.
  • The view around the site.
  • The view around the site.
  • Antenna
  • Station

SOTA DL/AM-001 POTA DE-0594 / DE-0595 / DE-0797

Equipment taken:

  • Xiegu G-90 radio.
  • “Red Slug” ground mounted quarter-wave vertical.
  • 5.6m reflector element to make up a two element parasitic array.
  • 8Ah LifePO4 battery.
  • Lightweight headphones.
  • Smartphone for spotting.

Contacts Map

LOG:

Conclusions:

All in all the exercise was successful, as far as it could be with the radio conditions and good preparation for the EU-NA S2S event on November 7th, when it will no doubt be a lot colder, but at least that will be an afternoon activation.

73 ’til the next activation!

DD5LP/P – September 19th 2026 – Activation of SOTA DL/AM-001 Höhen Peißenberg and POTA 3-fer POTA DE-0594 Münchner Jakobsweg, DE-0595 Sudostbayern Jakobsweg & DE-0797 König Ludwigweg.

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Preparation:

This activation on Höhen Peißenberg was in preparation for a similar action on October 17th, when a Summit-to-Summit event is scheduled between UK/EU and VK/ZL. As three POTA trails also pass over Höhen Peißenberg, these are also included here, however the primary activation was for SOTA.

The equipment used for both this test and the actual event in October was the same equipment tested out on the previous Thursday in my POTA 4-fer activation and it was loaded in the car on Friday so as to reduce noise during my early 7 am start on Saturday morning.

The Activation

This test was suggested by Andrew VK1AD and several other activators agreed to come out and see what would be possible. Unfortunately the weather in the UK turned out to be less than friendly with high winds and in some areas, storms, so only a few UK SOTA portable stations were on

On the other hand, I was greeted with sunny if cold (7°C) weather on the summit. I was set up and operational by 8 am local (0600 UTC) rather than my planned 0630 UTC, despite having to divert around two road closures en-route. As as soon as I had set up, I was called by Ernie VK3DET, who had also agreed to be on, so that I would at least get one VK call in my log. As time went on however, the number of DX stations were quite respectable, despite very deep QSB and lots of QRM (it was Saturday after all and the 20m band was full).

In an hour of operating I managed 11 contacts in all, 7 into VK, 1 into ZL, two into Russia and one into Sweden. The one S2S contact that I managed was with Andrew VK1AD, who had arranged this “test”. Several VK SOTA stations seemed to have decided only to operate on CW – possibly thinking there was no chance of SSB getting through. Once again SSB, even just 20w and a relatively simple antenna, will get through, at least for an exchange of reports but in some cases, a short conversation was also possible.

I did listen for the few stations who were out in the UK, on their spotted frequencies, I could hear “something” in the noise and the stations calling them however the skip was too long today for contacts into the UK.

Photos:

  • Antenna
  • View around site.
  • View around site.
  • View around site.
  • View around site.
  • Station

SOTA DL/AM-001 POTA DE-0594 / DE-0595 / DE-0797

Equipment taken:

  • Xiegu G-90 radio.
  • “Red Slug” ground mounted quarter-wave vertical.
  • 5.6m reflector element to make up a two element parasitic array.
  • 8Ah LifePO4 battery.
  • Lightweight headphones.
  • Smartphone for spotting.

Contacts Map (not contacts were all made by long path, not short path as shown)

LOG:

Conclusions:

The fact that the field had just been mown, was a nice surprise, however there was always the risk that the farmer may appaer at any point to collect the cut grass to use as winter fodder for his animals, as has happened to me before on this summit.

Overall, all equipment worked, although the radial wires on the driven element got tangled up and cost me extra time (I am going to see if I have enough of the silicon rubber covered wire to update this set of radials, as the other set does not get the same issue).

At one point, I lost about half of my RF output, this seems to have been caused by a bad microphone connection. I do have a spare cable but until the problem becomes permanent, I will continue to monitor.

73 ’til the next activation!

DD5LP/P – September 17th 2026 – Activation of POTA 4-fer on Weihermoos Moorweg DE-0564 Kemptner Wald Natura 2000, DE-0594 Münchner Jakobsweg NHT, DE-0963 Wandertrilogie Allgau – Weissengänger NHT & DE-0964 Wandertrilogie Allgau – Wasserläufer NHT.

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Preparation:

As my wife, wished to go to the thermal baths for a longer period, I looked for a park that I had not yet activated, further away and came across one, which in fact, had an easy to access on foot point that was not only in my new park but also on the crossing point of three trails, making this a “4-fer”.In preparation for an S2S test from DL-VK early on Saturday morning (the actual event is on the 17th of October), this Thursday midday provided an opportunity to test out all the equipment planned for Saturday. The Saturday activation is likely to only be on 20 metres and while 20m long path at dawn can be very productive, 20m at lunchtime is normally not. the middle of the day is better for 40m, so as well as testing the 2-element parasitic vertical array, to avoid the need to set up a second antenna for 40m (the array only covers 20-10m), I would use the 40m loading coil in the driven element and remove the reflector.

In case of rain, I also packed as backup my three magnet car roof mount and the Komunica Power HF PRO2 antenna as the parking area is at least in the park and on two of the three trails.

The Activation

POTA DE-0564, 0594, 0963, 0964

After dropping my wife off at the spa, I took a casual drive south into the Allgau Alpen foothills where this park is located. I had expected that overall I would have more than enough time to drive down set-up, operate, pack up and return. As it turned out I arrived back just minutes before the agreed pick-up time for my wife. the drive down and back were longer due to a road closure and diversion, however the bigger delay was in getting contacts once I had set everything up. Twenty metres, as expected was not at its best and add to that some military QRM (OTHR?) and deep QSB and contacts that would normally have been easy became difficult. Calling for P2P contacts I was repeatedly QRMed by home stations – who will definitely have heard me by their strength with me. It seems the protocol followed in SOTA of allowing S2S portable stations to call in ahead of just chaser calls, is NOT followed in POTA and it’s a free for all between QRP portable stations with limited antennas and home stations with high power and large antennas.

In the end I achieved 11 contacts of those seven on 20m with one P2P and 5 on 40m with three P2P contacts. Having 4 park numbers to give out (as needed in a P2P exchange) in less than great conditions made several contacts even on 40m a lot longer than normal. I would have liked to have stayed on and given more chasers the 4-parks however I had to staop to have enough time to pack up and get back to collect my wife. Also while initialy it was sunny, there was a point where rain clouds came over before clearing and these seemed to be returning, so taking everything into account, I operated as long as I could have.

The conclusion on the equipment – everything is working fine ready for Saturday’s EU-VK S2S test event.

Photos:

  • Car parking with a funny track description
  • track directions
  • Trail information – NO Bicycles!
  • Allgau NHT signs
  • Small funny items along track
  • View around site
  • View around site
  • View around site
  • View around site
  • View around site
  • Station
  • Antenna

POTA DE-0564, 0594, 0963, 0964

Equipment taken:

  • Xiegu G-90 radio.
  • “Red Slug” ground mounted quarter-wave vertical.
  • 5.6m reflector element to make up a two element parasitic array.
  • 8Ah LifePO4 battery.
  • Lightweight headphones.
  • Smartphone for spotting
  • Three foot mag mount (not used)
  • Komunica HF-PRO 2 plus-T (not used).

Contacts Map

LOG:

Conclusions:

Overall a good activation with band problems but thankfully no equipment problems.

73 ’til the next activation!

5B/VK2JI/P – August 20th, 21st, 25th & 27th 2026 – POTA, BOTA, HEMA & SOTA activation attempts in the Cyprus-Larnaca region.

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Preparation:

This blog is about a series of activations during my holiday on Cyprus in August 2026. The preparation through antenna builds and operational tests took place during June and July and is covered in other blog pots. In short, the principal was to take as little radio equipment as possible, so as to reduce both the weight and volume of what would have to be transported.

The configuration decided upon was the QRP Xiegu G106 radio, which while specified as producing 5 watts output, is actually nearer to 8 or 10w on several bands – in any case, still, as per the definition “QRP” as I would be using this on SSB. Given that operation from the beach was planned, even though the Beaches on the air is somewhat strange and incorrect with beach names in Cyprus, The main antenna would be the two element parasitic array or two Chinese telescopic whips, that I have been working on over the last few weeks. For non-beach operations, just the driven element (a quarter wave ground mounted vertical) would be used. This antenna covers the 5 bands from 20m to 10m. As a backup, I packed the RHM8B loaded telescopic whip from Diamond and a mini-tripod and radial wires as well as a single magnet, car rooftop mount.

Given the G106 uses very little power, I took just a 2 Ah 12.6V LifePO4 battery which I was able to charge in a couple of hours from my smart LifePO4 charger. In fact the battery was only one one occasion less than 3/4 full after an activation, and then it was only half empty. The 4 Ah LifePO4 battery which I took as a back up never got used.

The Activations

BOTA 37762 CTO Beach, Pyla 20-08-2026

The first activation after arriving was an early morning one from the local beach across the road from our apartment. I was not sure how this was going to work out as there are only a few “chasers” for the Beaches on the Air Scheme and no specific spotting site. I had however posted alerts for 4 beaches, two of which it turned our were not possible, one because access was problematic and the other as it was over the border in the “UK Sovereign Base Area” where the Cypriot licence does not apply and only servicemen or ex-servicemen can apply for the needed ZC4 callsign.

Luckily some of my UK and VK friends were willing to try for a contact. After setting up the quarter wave vertical, I was hearing them but not as well as I might, I set-up the parasitic reflector and things improved however conditions were not great. In the log for this first attempt, I got EA7BZ M9MMM/P VK3DET VK5PAS VK7DZ VK4ARZ and G1IZO – seven contacts in the log. Which was not a bad effort, for a first attempt.

When I was considering packing up, I was invited into the ANZ Net which runs each day out of VK and worked a couple of people there – Thanks Paul. Then a little later I was approached by a runner on the beach to ask what I was doing. I explained and he said he was a local policeman out for his morning run and had never seen amateur radio before. I offered to show him my licences but he wasn’t bothered and wished me an enjoyable day.

Photos:

  • Driven element set-up
  • Station
  • Beach View
  • Beach View
  • Beach View
  • Close-up of Station pack
  • Antenna showing driven and reflector elements
  • Beach View

Log: No log as there is no log entry to BOTA.

BOTA 37763 Havana Beach / POTA CY-0144 & PARC CY-LA-0144 Pyla Beach Park 21-08-2026

This second activation, a day later needed a 10 minute drive and had planned to be in the children’s Park itself as BOTA allows operation not actually on the beach as long as no main road is in between. In the end, I activated from the beach, as the ground in the children’s park was rock hard or filled with play equipment (how this is a POTA/PARC park, I’m not sure!). PARC is a new scheme started, it seems in response to the US POTA management cutting 75% of all French POTA parks out of the POTA system. It appears to cover all POTA regions however.

This was not to be as productive an activation as the previous day with several more stations on 20m causing QRM and forcing me to QSY on a regular basis. In one case, a VK4 station who was trying to work me, told off in no uncertain terms, a VK2 station, who had simply come up and started calling CQ on top of me during an over. I could hear both sides of the (heated) conversation perfectly. I had the antenna set up for Long Path, it would have been interesting to switch the reflector to the other side and try short path, as from Cyprus, at this time of day (0600 UTC) short Path may have been a better option (short path is rarely an option in the more northern latitude of Germany) but I didn’t get chance to try it. Given that the long path needs to go over the mountains on the island of Cyprus where short path would be a take off over the Mediterranean sea.

Photos:

  • View around beach
  • View around beach
  • View around beach
  • View around beach
  • Radio
  • Antenna

Log:

SOTA 5B/CY-047 Neon Appidhaki 25-08-2026

The first activation away from the beach, was planned to be the first of three in the day and turned out to be a “challenge” to get to. Although the review I read, said a 4WD car was not needed, only one with good ground clearance, I should have seen from the photo in that review, that a 4WD was actually being used. Even with a fairly high rental car (a Toyota Corolla), it was a very difficult drive to get up the summit. I eventually got to the point where SOTA mapping shows the summit to be (not at the small church as stated in the other report, however that would still be in the activation zone). This was not going to be a location where I could put both sections from the array up and indeed, being later that the previous activations, I needed a 360° antenna pattern and so simply put up the quarter waave vertical. It was a VERY hot day and on top of the hill, there was no shade, so I was happy when I eventualöly got some contacts in the log. These were mainly search and pounce or trying to call other SOTA activators, although I did get a few responses to mx “CQ SOTA” calls.

Photos:

  • View around site.
  • View around site.
  • View around site.
  • View around site.
  • View around site.
  • View around site.
  • View around site.
  • Station
  • Station
  • Antenna
  • View around site.
  • View around site.

Log:

HEMA 5B/HCY-050 Orokini Hilltop and POTA CY-0063 Orokini Lake park 25-08-2026

Both of these activation attempts were “fails”. The first, Orokini Hilltop was equally difficult to drive to as the previous SOTA site. The views were nice and the equipment seemed to be working fine, but I was getting no response to my CQs and calling stations, I was not being heard. I believe this was simply a bad time of day for 20m (around lunch time) and too early to get contacts on 40m. With the heat from the pounding down sunshine, once I realised I would not be getting any contacts, I decided to pack up and head down to the (hopefully) cooler POTA location for the next activation.

On arriving at the parking spot, this was always planned to be a “PLOTA” as there is very little room to set up the quarter wave vertical, even though the lake (or salt fields as it was on this day) may have helped the vertical, had there been any space to set it up.

Tuning around 20 metres there was NOTHING – so I thought, this is likely, again the wrong time of day so I re-adjusted the RHM-8B on the mag mount, to its 40m setting and tuned around again – northing!

I was suspicious – so I pulled the coax lead and the background noise level from the radio did not change! I checked the coax cable and the Diamond antenna as best I could and could not locate where the fault was. With time lost on Orokini Hilltop and the problems now at this site, I decided it was time to call it a day and go and pick up my wife from the beach.

Photos:

  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop
  • Orokini Hilltop – Radio
  • Orokini Hilltop – antenna
  • POTA CY-0066 Orokini Lake
  • POTA CY-0066 Orokini Lake

POTA CY-0099 & PARC CY-LA-0099 Lefkara Area Natura 2000 27-08-2026

This was an extra activation, fitted in after the previous two fails, to make sure the equipment was still working. Unfortunately, as this was to coincide with my wife visiting the crafts village Pano Lefkara, the time of day would again not be great. This time however, I did make enough contacts. This park is in two pieces, one half has no roads running through it and no where easy to walk to to activate within that half. The other half however overlapped part of a road near to where a convent is located and their large car park is nicely in the park. Better still, as I found out, just off the end of the car park and further into the park, there is an orchard area, which was ideal to set up the radio and antenna in. So that is what I did and while there was no real DX contacts, I did manged to get the needed 10 contacts to qualify this POTA/PARC park and head back into the village to collect my wife before I totally roasted away in the hot sun!

Photos:

  • Car Park & convent.
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • Radio
  • Antenna

Log:

Equipment taken:

  • Xiegu G-106 HF 5W radio.
  • Diamond RHM-8B loaded HF antenna and tripod and mag mount (failed).
  • 2 element parasitic phased vertical array antenna for 20-10m
  • 2 Ah LifePO4 battery.
  • 4 Ah LifePO4 battery (not used)
  • Lightweight headphones.
  • Smartphone for spotting.

Conclusions:

Although, the configuration that I took worked (at least when something didn’t fail and there were better than average conditions), I feel that despite the extra weight, I would have been better taking the 20w Xiegu G90, two 4 Ah batteries and the Komunica Power HF-PRO-2 antenna, in place of the G106 and Diamond RHB-8B antenna. The two element parasitic phased array however would still be taken as it did appear to perform well. 

73 ’til the next activation!

DD5LP/P – August 13th 2026 – PLOTA activation of 3-fer POTA – DE-0981 Kesselberggebeit FF DE-0966 Maximilliansstrasse NHT and DE-0594 Münchnerjakobsweg Keilheim bis Bodensee NHT

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Preparation:

As you will see from the title, this was to be a car based activation, not the “true portable” ones that I have been doing lately to test out the equipment for my 5B (Cyprus) trip. This was a fill-in activation of a park which I had not, to date, activated and also two trails, which I had. The equipment would be the 20-Watt Xiegu G90 on the back seat of the car and the Komunica Power HF-PRO2-PLUS-T loaded vertical whip on a three magnet mount on the car roof.

As it turned out, the spot I chose had limited space with cars parked at an angle to the side of the busy road, so this configuration would be the only practical one in this location.

While my wife attendedd the Franz Marc museum in Kochel, I would drive about 20 minutes further south to the point where these three POTA entities overlap.

The car was packed the previous day to minimise time needed on-site to set-up.

The Activation

POTA DE-0981 / DE-0966 / DE-0594

After dropping off my wife at the museum, I continued down the road to the parking spot, which was very full, however on my second attempt, I found a free spot, parked up and set-up. With temps over 30°C, I opened all of the car’s windows but even with those open, there was very little wind and longer than the hour that I was there would have become difficult. This was approaching midday, so I did not expect any DX but decided to start on 20m SSB in any case as I could see some POTA activators spotted there. Firstly I looked around for strong stations, just to get into the log, then chased park-to-park contacts and finally found a free spot, spotted myself and called CQ. The QSB on the band was difficult but what was different today, was that some of the stations sounded to have corrupted audio. When you hear one station like this, you put it down to a problem with that stations radio, however I heard 4 or 5 of these and I wonder if this was in some way an effect from the partial (90%) solar eclipse that we had at sunset the previous day?

One surprise “out of nowhere” was Peter K2UPD from Lexington New York, calling me, as he does from time to time – he must have a GREAT station in a very quiet location!

More than enough contacts to qualify were obtained and so rather than switch to 40 metres, I decided to pack up and head back to pick up my wife, who was already waiting in the sun 15 minutes before our agreed time. All in all, it’s good to find that the old PLOTA configuration of the loaded vertical with the G90 radio, still works fine.

Photos:

  • Station
  • Antenna
  • View around the parking spot
  • View around the parking spot
  • View around the parking spot
  • View around the parking spot

Equipment taken:

  • Xiegu G-90 HF 20W radio.
  • Komunica Power HF-PRO2-PLUS-T loaded whip on aa 3-magnet base.
  • 8 Ah LifePO4 battery.
  • Lightweight headphones.
  • Smartphone for spotting.

Log:

POTA DE-0981/ DE-0966/ DE-0594

Conclusions:

Apart from some strange sounding stations, this activation had no surprises and confirms that the “PLOTA” configuration still works fine. 

73 ’til the next activation!

DD5LP/P – August 10th 2026 – Activation of POTA DE-1058 Lech zwischen Hirshau & Landsberg, DE-0968 Romantischestraße NHT, DE-0791 Lech Erlebnisweg NHT, DE-0663 Lechpark Pössinger Au Nature Recreation Area.

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Preparation:

Having activated this POTA “4-fer” park back in June, I looked around for a closer point to the car park, to reduce the time to get there as I wished to to test out the vertical array, rather than just the 1/4 wave vertical which I used last time. In the future I plan to include this 4-fer in a group of activations to enable 10 park activations in one day. The closer the activation site is to the car park, the less time needed.

Preparation for an activation using the planned equipment is very easy, I simply pick up the small rucksack with everything in it and leave home. In this case early enough to be able to catch the 20 metre long path propagation to Australia. Despite radio conditions being less than perfect on Sunday, this activation was planned for Monday morning, the 10th of August 2026.

The Activation

POTA DE-1058, 0968, 0791 & 0663

Rising at 6 am, following a rain storm did not bode well for this activation. This, of course, meant the tracks down to the park where I wanted to operate from would be slippery. I arrived at the car park at about 7:15 am local time and set off down to the new POTA 4-fer spot, that I had found looking at the satellite picture from Google Maps. When I got there, however, what I had expected to be a grassy, scrubby area turned out to be a field full of thistles! I had to look for somewhere else and eventually found a better location about 15-20 minutes later. During the whole time I operated, there were occasional rainy periods but nothing heavy and as I packed up to walk back to the car park, the sun came out, and the temps started to rise. Later in the day it was 38.7°C at home.

For the activation, I used the little G106 radio (5W) and my parasitic vertical array pointing west – it worked well again and the only time consuming part is laying out two sets of 8 radial wires – one set for the driven element and the other for the reflector.

As you will see from the log, one contact was made into Australia although I heard several more, some quite strong. So radio conditions turned out to not be as bad as was predicted (which is often the case). All other contacts were around Europe.

Photos:

  • Field of dreams? NO – field of thistles!
  • Along the path to the second site & the River Lech
  • Along the path to the second site & the River Lech
  • The view around the site.
  • The view around the site.
  • The view around the site.
  • The view around the site.
  • Antenna
  • Station.

DE-1058 / DE-0968 / DE-0791 / DE-0663

Equipment taken:

  • Xiegu G-106 radio.
  • “Red Slug” ground mounted quarter-wave vertical.
  • 5.6m reflector element to make up a two element parasitic array.
  • 2Ah Eremit LifePO4 battery.
  • Lightweight headphones.
  • Smartphone for spotting.

Contacts Map

LOG:

Conclusions:

The fact that what I expected to be an open grassy area, turned out to be a field of thistles and hence making it unusable, was a surprise. For what I had hoped to be a quick to access location, was not to be, however the second location, when approached over other tracks than I took, may still be an acceptable option for the future ten parks in a day attempt.

The equipment worked perfectly and underlines that this choice of small five watt radio and vertical array is the best equipment combination to take to Cyprus with me.

73 ’til the next activation!

DD5LP/P – July 31st 2026 – activation of 2-fer POTA – DE-0663 Lechpark Possinger Au and DE-1058 Lech Zwischen Hirschau & Landsberg

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Preparation:

Just two weeks away from our trip to 5B (Cyprus), I wanted to do a full blown test of the radio equipment that I plan to take with me. I have tried out parts of the set-up previously but this time it would be the 5W Xiegu G106 along with the Parasitic vertical array antenna. This consist of two Chinese 5.6m whips, one with a feed point (known by may as the “red slug” given its bright red colour) the other whip connecting directly to the ground stake, trough a long M10 nut, Both parts have eight three metre long radial wires and the two whips are spaced at a 1/4 wavelength apart. The driven element’s telescopic whip is set to 1/4 wavelength high and the Reflector element to 7% more. With a great deal of help from Rob DM1CM, author and owner of the portable-antennas.com website, I have a chart of lengths and spacings for all of the bands between 20m and 10 metres. However for this outing, I will be concentrating on 20 metres. and as some of my friends in Australia also plan to be on-air, I hope to be able to measure whether the reflector element of the array is actually working, or whether I might as well simply take the 1/4 vertical antenna without the reflector, to Cyprus.

On other activations, I have packed the car the previous day as an early 7 am start was planned before driving to the local POTA park, however as EVERYTHING packs inside a small 25 litre? rucksack, for this activation, pre-packing of the car was not needed.

The Activation

POTA DE-0663 / DE-1058

After parking the car, it’s only a 5 minute walk to where I set up in the overlapping area of two parks (hence this is a POTA 2fer). I actually timed the complete set up and it took 20 minutes (pull down only took 10 minutes). With the mast and Inverted-V dipole or even the tripod and loaded vertical with the G90 radio, set-up often takes 30 minutes, so this is already an improvement, helped by the fact that radio, ATU and battery are all in a very small belt-bag, so once the antenna is up, its just a matter of plugging in the radio, trimming the antenna match and then getting on air.

This was definitely the case and as soon as I was set up, I was already hearing stations from Australia and the US. After a check with the group via WhatsApp, I found what frequency they were on an a contact with Jon VK7JON operating static mobile from his car on the Tasmanian coast followed. This was with the “complete” antenna (driven element and reflector element) with the antenna pointing west – as I need for the Long Path propagation to Australia. We exchanged 57 (Ed to Jon) and 56 (Jon to Ed) reports.

As signals were so good, this was the ideal opportunity to remove the reflector and see what difference there was on receive and transmit signal strengths and Jon kindly agreed to wait until I unscrewed and laid the reflector on the ground. I’m happy to report there was a noticeable difference and reports were now 5-4 to 5 (Ed to Jon) and 5-3 to 4 (Jon to Ed). Once I re-erect the reflector, signals were back up as before. All of this action took around 5 minutes and so I think the results can be trusted. The full parasitic array has earned it’s trip to Cyprus with us!

Surprisingly, I was also hearing and later managed to work Mike M9MMM/P in the UK. Normally when skip is long he and I don’t get a contact without going to 40 metres. Soon after I also worked Ernie VK3DET with him being a good 5-7 signal and giving me 4-5. All of these contacts were through our group “net” and arranged via the WhatsApp back-channel. The interesting contact came a little later when Peter VK3ACZ came back to my POTA CQ calls and we exchanged 5-4 reports although I think Peter may have been a little generous. Still being early in the morning getting the rest of the needed contacts to qualify the POTA parks took time but at the end of my one hour outing, I had 11 in the log.

This activation / test could not have gone better and I thank the “Comms Testers” group for their support. It is an honour to be able to work VK on 20 metres with just 5 watts of SSB signal, when I know a lot of other amateurs living in the middle of metro noise can only dream of it. Other hams, while realising the advantage of a low noise floor when portable still often doubt that such contacts are possible except perhaps on FT8. It’s always a matter of luck combined with good timing. Unfortunately at the moment that “good timing” requires me to get out of bed earlier than I would like! At least in Cyprus, I gain another hour, as they are at UTC +3 rather than the UTC + 2 that I have here..

Photos:

  • View around the site.
  • View around the site.
  • View around the site.
  • View around the site.
  • View around the site.
  • View around the site.
  • View around the site.
  • View around the site.
  • View around the site.
  • View around the site.
  • The radio “pack”
  • The vertical Array antenna

Equipment taken:

  • Xiegu G-106 HF 5W radio.
  • Parasitic vertical array consisting of a quarter wave vertical and a reflector element.
  • 2 Ah LifePO4 battery.
  • Lightweight headphones.
  • Smartphone for spotting.

Log:

POTA DE-0663/ DE-1058

Conclusions:

With the results from this activation, I think I now have a lightweight, small HF station suitable to be taken on the trip to Cyprus in a couple of weeks time. I do have one change noted however and that is to add protection to the end of the ground stakes so they don’t push holes into their bags. 

73 ’til the next activation!

DD5LP/P – July 16th 2026 – Activation of POTA DE-1058 Lech zwischen Hirshau & Landsberg, DE-0968 Romantischestraße NHT, DE-0791 Lech Erlebnisweg NHT, DE-0663 Lechpark Pössinger Au Nature Recreation Area and DL-BOTA (Bunkers on the air) B/DL-1193 Landsberger Scholßberggarage atombunker.

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Preparation:

This POTA “4-fer” is a nearby location (within the same Maidenhead locator square as my home), however, it is only accessible on foot or by bicycle, not a PLOTA by any means! It also happens to be within the allowed 1 km radius of the Atom Bunker in Landsberg am Lech (B/DL-1193 in the Bunkers on the Air scheme).

To activate this point a fairly long walk from the nearest car park is needed – about 20 minutes, even taking the short-cut tracks that I found checking hiking maps. My usual 14-15 kilo heavy rucksack with my G90 fibreglass mast antennas and battery, while do-able is not the best option, especially when I have been working on aa lightweight ~ 4 kilo pack that I will take to Cyprus with me in August. This therefore would be a good opportunity to test out this QRP solution.

Despite earlier weather reports saying this week would be hot and sunny, Tuesday and Wednesday brought thunderstorms and even hail, so the planned activation on Thursday would depend upon what the weather would turn out to be. I set my alarm to 6 am (0600 UTC) with the hope of catching the long path on 20 metres into Australia.

The Activation

BOTA B/DL-1193, POTA DE-1058, 0968, 0791 & 0663

Rising at 6 am, the sky still looked overcast and given the downpour over the last two days there was a good chance that the tracks down into the park may be unpassable. Despite that, I decided to try – at worst this would act as a “reccie” for a second attempt.

Arriving at the car park behind the caravan camping grounds, I parked up and then grabbed my small rucksack and headed back up the road, to where the track was supposed to start. When I got there, I saw that the track had had a wooden barrier built across it, but it was obvious people had simply walked around the end of it, so I did the same. A little further down the track, there were red and white tapes strung between the trees. Obviously someone did not want this track to be used. Whatever, I clambered around the tree to join the track at the other side. Interesting, from this point there was a worse-looking track heading straight up the bank to near the car park, which then became the (shorter) route that I took on my return journey. The rest of my route was, as on my map, and I soon arrived at the area where, on one side, there is a cycle parking spot and at the other a Kneipp basin (a small area of water with stones in the bottom of it, which people walk over to improve their feet and ankles). Just past the cycle parking area, there was a grassy area going off towards the river, which suited me perfectly (apart from the high, wet grass). Luckily, this had not turned into a bog from all of the recent rain.

After setting up the equipment, I tuned around 20m to see how it was performing, and the first station I found was Jon VK7JON/M – one of the Australian friends that I often talk with and had hoped to contact. He was not a strong signal, though – S2 at best, and he runs 100W from his static mobile location while I was only running 5w. I called him – no reply. I messaged him, and we tried again – nothing – I could hear him, but he could not hear me. He then had Mike VK7MD/M call me, but Mike was even weaker at S1, so that did not work either. Even Ernie VK3DET with his high power and beam was not audible to me. This was to be the story of this activation. The band, whether 20m or 40m, which I tried as I needed contacts for the POTA activation, was very difficult. It was not that the bands were noisy, rather that the signals were simply not travelling as they usually do. I even received a report on 40 metres of 1-1 from a station in Munich! Then in contrast I got a 5-9 report from Central Switzerland, so today was a strage one for conditions. Of course, initially I worried that something might be wrong with my radio or antenna with those low reports (even for QRP) but then the good reports told me that in fact it was simply radio conditions that were bad today.

Once I had the needed 10 contacts (including one P2P with another 4-fer POTA location in France), I needed to pack up and head back to the car as my wife needed it. The walk back was fine as I knew the route. Of course it was no where as easy as the trip in as this time it was up-hill.

The strange technical issue was that at one point I was hearing what I presume was Radio China right across the band. Weak but there behind other signals. Given that it was there over the complete band, I can only think that they are transmitting on a frequency that is mixing to make the IF frequency of this radio, with a very strong signal (they use Europe-based transmitters as well as those in the Far East) that it was breaking through.

Photos:

  • Following the trail(s)
  • View of River Lech
  • Wooden artwork along the trail
  • Following the trail(s)
  • Small waterfall
  • Wooden artwork along the trail
  • Following the trail(s)
  • View around site
  • View around site
  • View around site
  • View around site
  • Station
  • Antenna

B/DL-1193 / DE-1058 / DE-0968 / DE-0791 / DE-0663

Equipment taken:

  • Xiegu G-106 radio.
  • “Red Slug” ground mounted quarter-wave vertical.
  • 2Ah Eremit LifePO4 battery.
  • Lightweight headphones.
  • Smartphone for spotting.

Contacts Map

LOG:

Conclusions:

I was surprised that conditions were so bad but happy that the weather stayed dry. The lightweight pack is far easier to carry than the usual kit, however, had anything failed, I had little back-up possibility, whereas with the larger pack, I have several spares. Two antennas mast/tripod, even extra batteries.

For what it is, the cheap G106 rather competes above its weight, as does the simple quarter-wave antenna made with a 5.6m telescopic whip, the “slug” feed point and its ground stake. I am happy to take this small kit to Cyprus, with some spares in a second bag, which will stay in the apartment unless needed, so keeping the carried weight down.

73 ’til the next activation!

DD5LP/P – June 15th 2026 – Activation of POTA – DE-1254 Luitpolpark Schwabmünchen

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Preparation:

Despite the nice weather, for convenience, this activation of a new-to-me park would be a PLOTA rather than out on the ground. While my wife was at a thermal Spa, I would drive the roughly 30 minutes to this park and activate it from my car, parked in the car park within the park area. Reading online, it seems that this parking area filled quickly, but I was hoping that being on a weekday, it would not be a problem, and indeed that was the case. On a public holiday or at the weekend, that could be different, as this park has a lot of different sports and other attractions (including a beer garden) in it. The police are reported to be very unhappy if visitors park in the nearby streets when the car park is full.

I was surprised to see on the POTA Map site how small this (town) park was. I had always thought that unless they have some special historical meaning, small town parks were not allowed in the POTA system. Perhaps the rules in Germany have changed from the original global rules? We now have cycling trails and lakes in the DL scheme, so I think there is an effort to widen the scheme (possibly to avoid other schemes being set up for the entities not covered by POTA? LLOTA comes to mind).

The Activation

POTA DE-1254

Apart from a small delay firstly behind a large lorry and then a farm tractor on the country roads that lead from the Thermal Spa to the park, the run up was without incident. Indeed, the first closed road I came to was close to the park and diverted traffic was sent down the road I needed with the parking area on it.

On arrival at the parking area within the park, it was almost empty, with perhaps 5 cars in it; it could easily hold 60. So I parked where I could see I would have no problems with tree branches in the way when I put the loaded whip on the car roof and then checked my phone for other members of our little Comms testers (UK-EU/VK group) – It was 10;30 am local time, so I wasn’t expecting any contacts into Australia today, but Ernie VK3DET kindly took a listen for me in any case. He could hear nothing and indeed could see nothing at all on his radio’s waterfall. The 20-metre long-path propagation had certainly ended a couple of hours earlier.

I had up to 90 minutes of activation time planned, so before continuing, I took a swift walk around the park, as you will see from the pictures. This is a compact park, with lots included in its area. As I was already on 20 metres, I spotted myself and called CQ POTA, and a few contacts came in. They were just within Europe, except for one – K2UPD – Peter in Jamesville, New York State, USA. I have worked him before, and he must have a fantastic station as he comes through, and more importantly hears stations in Europe when others do not. His information on qrz.com is limited. I would have liked to learn what he has for antennas. I suppose he could have been operating a remote station in Europe, but he did not say so, and of course he would need a different call sign if that was the case.

Once the calls ended to my CQs on 20 metres I switched to 40 metres where I could see there were a few other POTA activators out and first tried those for P2P contacts before trying again to get callers to my CQ calls. I ended up with 13 logged contacts across 20 & 40 metres and decided to finish and pack everything up, so I could leisurly return to collect my wife. As it turned out, this was a good decision as several kilometres of road were limited to a speed of 30 km/h as the road markings were being re-painted.

All worked out well on the return journey and I had a new park in my list of activated parks.

Photos:

  • Park signs.
  • Park signs.
  • Park signs.
  • Park signs.
  • A walk through the park.
  • A walk through the park.
  • A walk through the park.
  • A walk through the park.
  • A walk in the park.
  • Beer Garden.
  • Beer Garden.
  • Beer Garden.
  • Art (for kids).
  • Station.
  • Antenna.

Equipment taken:

  • Xiegu G90.
  • Three magnet roof mount.
  • 80-10m Linked dipole and 6 metre mast (not used).
  • Komunica Power HF-PRO2-PLUS-T loaded vertical whip band tripod.
  • 8 Ah LifePO4 battery.
  • Lightweight headphones.
  • Smartphone for spotting.

Log:

POTA DE-1254

Conclusions:

A nice way to fill in 90 minutes, using a known good set-up, but next time should be a “REAL” Portable operation again …!

 73 ’til the next activation!

DD5LP/P – June 2nd 2026 – Activation of POTA DE-0858 Via Sancti Martini NHT and DE-0963 Wandertrilogie Allgäu – Wiesengänger NHT and HEMA DL/HBY-018 Sattlersbuckl (on Sattlersbuckl)

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Preparation:

As a time fill-in while my car was at its annual service, I planned an activation. This time, it was not going to be an activation from the car/loan car, rather a “real” portable activation, involving a walk of some distance with all required radio equipment on my back.

It’s a while since I have done a HEMA activation, and also some time since I have climbed Sattlersbuckl and since two POTA trails go over the summit, this seemed like a good choice.

It used to be that if I activated a SOTA summit, I would often have over 25 contacts in an hour; the SOTA scheme was that well supported. HEMA has never been well supported by chasers outside of the UK, and in Germany, I believe I may be the ONLY activator. So to have the advantage of posting to the POTA site meant (I hoped) that I should have more than enough callers for this location.

I have activated all three entities here before, in the case of the POTA trails from more than one other location.

Given the planning between dropping off the car for its service, and also bringing my wife to a thermal spa, my radio gear and food, etc., all needed to be packed into, or onto my 40-litre backpack. This was to be transferred from my car to the loan/rental car at the dealer’s. As the weather was not certain to be sunny or dry, as a fallback, I had also scouted out a location where I could do a “PLOTA” activation, at least on the two POTA trails.

The Activation

HEMA DL/HBY-018, POTA DE-0858 & 0953

After dropping my car off at the dealers followed by my wife at the spa, I drove south in the loaner Ford Puma Electric Car (I am not a fan of E-autos after this experience – not that anything “bad” happened but these cars have no “soul” but so many things controlling what you can do, that it almost feels like you are not driving the car!). In any case, the weather was “mixed”, but I decided to stick to the original plan, and after getting to my usual parking spot, just outside of Apfeltrang, I started the steep walk up to Sattlersbuckl.

This track up often holds surprises, and today, I saw a young deer come out onto the track in front of me, but as soon as it saw me, it shot off back into the bushes. It all happened to quickly for me to grab any photos, unfortunately.

On arriving at my operating spot, I put up the mast and linked dipole, set to 40 metres, spotted myself and tried calling CQ. Not only were the radio conditions disappointing, but there was also lots of QRM, causing me to change frequency twice. I had got a couple of contacts on 40 metres but only semi-local in continental Europe. This being lunchtime, I had not even considered 20 metres, but given the problems on 40 metres, I decided to give 20 metres a try and managed then to get a couple of good contacts into the UK. By my timing, I could have stayed another 30 minutes or so; however, as I then felt a few drops of rain, I decided the best decision would be to pack everything up again (which takes about 20 minutes in any case), and start off back down the hill to the car. The end result from some very disappointing radio conditions was 15 contacts ( one a duplicate on 40 & 20m and one P2P – I tried for a second P2P, but the conditions were simply not good enough.

Arriving at the car, I was 30 minutes ahead of my planned schedule; the rain clouds had disappeared, and the sun was out again.

The one technical issue I had this time was an old one – with the sunshine, I was unable to see the screen of my Smartphone, so I will need to look at some kind of screen for it. It did, at one point, pop up a message about high temperature, so I was probably close to it shutting itself down.

Photos:

  • Track to summit
  • Trail signs
  • Track to summit
  • Approaching site
  • Trail signs
  • Location reached
  • Mast Base installed
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • View around the site
  • Antenna
  • Station

DL/HBY-018 / DE-0858 / DE-0963

Equipment taken:

  • Xiegu G-90 radio.
  • Komunica Power HF-PRO2-PLUS-T loaded vertical antenna, tripod and radial wires (not used).
  • Linked dipole antenna.
  • 6 metre fibreglass pole.
  • Screw-in Sun Umbrella base
  • Single magnet mount (not used).
  • 8 Ah LifePO4 battery.
  • 2 x 4Ah Eremit LifePO4 batteries (not used).
  • Lightweight headphones.
  • Smartphone for spotting.

Contacts Map

LOGS:

POTA DE-0858 / DE-0963

HEMA DL/HBY-018

Conclusions:

I was surprised that conditions were so bad after a period of good propagation – the bands seemed to be “diluted”, and contacts that were achieved were at a lower signal strength and with heavy QSB. I had wondered if this was an issue with my equipment, but others were making the same comments so this was just a “bad radio day”. I did achieve the needed number of contacts, got some good exercise, and we got home just as the heavy rain started. So all in all, this was a good day.

73 ’til the next activation!