Preparation:

Following along from my POTA 3-Fer (which I didn’t realise was a 3-Fer until afterwards) on January 14th, I started checking where multiple POTA entities (parks or trails) crossed or ran together. These spots often seemed to be where large churches with a hostelry were (I guess pilgrims do need sustenance after a day’s walking). A great help in doing this is a website called pota-map-info which maps out the POTA trails and parks (and also SOTA summits) for the German-speaking countries in Europe. This must have been a major undertaking as getting the exact routes of trails and boundaries of parks in a digital mapping format from many different sources is very difficult.

Thanks to this great resource, I was able to quickly see that three trails converged on what is also a SOTA summit (DL/AM-001) at Hoher Peißenberg. In the summer, this could therefore be a good choice for a combined SOTA/POTA activation however in pouring rain/sleet, the attraction to operate from within my car (which in POTA is allowed but not in SOTA) was too great. as a second purpose for this activation was the chance to test out my recently completed portable amplifier box. Normally I operate just 20 watts of SSB from my Xiegu G90 radio but there are times when a little more (such as during the international Lighthouse and Lightship weekend) when closer to 100 watts would be useful. The “pelican-like” plastic case, not only holds the converted Chinese 20-30MHz amplifier but also a band-switchable Low Pass Filter and an Antenna matching unit – the well-known ATU-100. To power all this the case has a 12 AmpHour LifePO4 battery strapped into it and this also provides the power for whichever radio I decide to use with it, whether the G106, G90 or X6200 – all have the needed 5 watts drive to produce at least 60 watts output from the box (more on some bands). This box had been tested in the cellar into a dummy load but not yet in a real activation.

    Following the same process used on recent POTA car activations, the radio gear was set up in the car ready for use, the previous day, even down to the three-magnet base being put on the car rook (but without the HF-PRO2-PLUS-T attached, so that all would be ready for an early (8 am local time, 07:00 UTC) start the following day. As usual, Ernie VK3DET had promised to listen out for me however I expected him to be one of my later contacts as the long path on the 20 metre band to Australia had only been opening around 09:00 UTC of late.  

The Activation

POTA DE-0594 & DE-0595 & DE-0797

After an uneventful drive down to Hoher Pießenberg (a run I have made, many, many times in the past), I was happy to find the car park almost empty and drove over to the parking fee machine and emptied 10 cents coin by 10 cents coin, my weighty and unwanted small change into the machine to pay the €2 fee for up to 3 hours parking.

This summit/site has the luxury of having a publically accessible toilet house where I also left some more of my unwanted small change (this time as a contribution, there is no fee for usage).

With the car now parked looking over the rolling meadows behind the church and looking towards the Ammer Lake, I took the pre-set antenna out of the back seat of the car and extended its telescopic whip to maximum length.

I powered on the new portable amplifier box, ran the ATU, found a free frequency, posted a spot on the POTA site and sent Ernie a message informing him that I was set up and running and would you know it, my first contact was with Ernie VK3DET in Victoria, Australia at 0750 UTC about an hour earlier than expected. He simply returned to my first CQ call as if I was just down the road! He was also working “barefoot” without his amplifier and this was an easy contact and nice to have him first in the log. A few more CQ calls and I slowly got up and past the required 10 contacts for a POTA activation (finishing with 14). There was no real pile-up this time, just hunters getting on and calling me when they saw the POTA spot. Contacts came in from all directions around Europe as you will see from the map and log below.

There were no calls from the US although my signal would be passing over the southern part of the US to get to Australia but looking at the clock difference, there’s an obvious reason why I got no calls from the US – they would all be in bed sleeping!

While there were no park-to-park contacts on this activation, several of the hunters were very happy to hear that they had scored 3 POTA contacts in one.    

Photos:

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Equipment taken:

• Xiegu G-90 radio.
• Portable amplifier box
• 6-metre mast and linked dipole (not used).
• Komunica Power HF-PRO2-PLUS-T loaded vertical antenna.
• Three magnets, car roof antenna mount.
• 12 Ah LifePO4 battery (in portable amplifier box).
• 2 Ah Eremit LifePO4 battery (not used).
• Plastic painter’s sheet and seat pad (not used).
• Lightweight headphones.
• Smartphone for spotting.

Log (same for all three POTA entities):

DE-0594 Münchner Jakobsweg, DE-0595 SüdostBayerischer Jakobsweg & DE-0797 König Ludwigs Weg

Conclusions:

• The Portable amplifier worked perfectly, signal reports were higher than usual and no problems (such as RF Ingres) were reported.
• A contact between DL and VK3 at 07:50 UTC on 20m SSB was a surprise and just goes to show that you can’t trust propagation to behave as you expect and the only option is to get out and try!
• The pota-map.info site is just what I bemoaned the lack of in my last but one activation report. Thanks to Rob DM1CM for pointing me to this great resource. It’s a shame that it only covers Germany, Switzerland, Lichtenstein and Austria but for me it’s ideal!

73 ’til the next activation!