Preparation:

This park had already been activated; however, it is a new park in the area, which I haven’t activated as yet and is another taken over from the WWFF scheme.

It fitted my needs of being only 30 minutes away from where I need to take my wife to a doctor’s appointment, giving me time to get there, activate for 45 minutes to an hour and then get back to pick up my wife.

The plan was, as it has been for a lot of recent activations, partially due to weather but also time considerations, to use the car-based set-up with the G90 and the HF-PRO2 antenna from the back seat of the car.

The Activation

POTA DE-1066

This was an afternoon trip, so I had plenty of time to load the radio equipment into the car after changing all of the wheels on the vehicle from those with summer tyres on to those with winter ones on (this is needed in this area before the bad winter weather comes, at which point the use of summer tyres is banned.

The trip to drop my wife off at the doctor’s, about 35 minutes away from home, went without incident and even bought me an extra 10 minutes of activation time, but as it turned out, contacts were to come in quickly, so the extra time was not needed.

The trip to the parking spot within the park that I had found was using Google Maps, and for some reason, it took me through some really narrow country roads where, to get past each other, traffic had to drive half off the road as there was only just one lane width of tarmac road. This was an “interesting” experience, and I was glad I had changed the wheels from the alloy wheels to the plain steel wheels when I hit one particularly nasty pot hole off the side of the road.

On arrival at the parking spot, a beautiful spot on the River Wurm, which it seems is a favourite spot for walkers, dog owners and those with mountain bikes. I put the antenna on the roof and started on 20 metres. Not knowing what to expect, finding good conditions within Europe, but no DX – at 1200 UTC, this was not surprising, and in any case, it was quantity rather than distance that I was seeking today. Within the about 50 minutes that I wanted to be on the air, I needed to get 10 contacts to qualify the park. In fact, I ended up with 23 on 20m and 2 on 15 metres in just over 40 minutes. Although I say I had no DX, the very first station that I worked, CU3HN in the Azores, was quite a distance away, but he often calls, and so must have a very good station. Most of the incoming calls were S9, and over 60% of my reports received were also S9 – not bad for 20 watts of SSB to a loaded whip on the car roof. This simple set-up continues to amaze.

Photos:

Equipment taken:

• Xiegu G-90 radio.
• Komunica Power HF-PRO2-PLUS-T loaded vertical antenna.
• 3-magnet car roof mount and single magnet mount (single not used).
• 8 Ah LifePO4 battery.
• 2 x 4Ah Eremit LifePO4 batteries (not used).
• Lightweight headphones.
• Smartphone for spotting.

Log:

POTA DE-1066

Conclusions:

The bands were kind to me. I even heard Indonesia on 15 metres, but the lady had such a pile-up, I had no choice of getting through. There was some ignition-generated interference on the bands (especially on 10 metres, which I checked but found no one to call) as the car park is alongside a main road.

The area around, however, is really beautiful, and I suspect that in summer it will be overrun with tourists. It was nice to visit, even though the top temperature was probably up to 12°C.

73 ’til the next activation!