Preparation:

Having spotted some new POTA parks in my area, I wanted to get my name on them as “First activator”, and as my wife had a physiotherapy appointment in a village near one (DE-1050 Ammerseegebeit Bird Sanctuary), I decided this was a great use of the waiting time for her appointment. Unfortunately, the day before, the practice called and cancelled as the therapist was sick. A new appointment (after some pressure) was made for Friday (2 days later). Having already prepared the radio gear for the activation and packed it in the car, we decided to go to the other side of Lake Ammer, where another new park had been added to POTA. This one ended up being a 3-fer if activated from one specific point, which I scouted out, and the plan was set. Depending on the weather, we would head out to this other new park. While my wife took a walk along the lakefront, I would head up into the forest and activate. The other park, with any luck, I would catch as the first activator for that one on Friday.

The Activation

POTA DE-1061 / DE-0594 / DE-0797

The day started with thick fog with a thin rain haze within it, so I was wondering whether this would work out, but luckily, as we drove cross-country, the weather slowly got better. It was never going to be a warm day, but as we arrived in Herrshing, it was not raining. The forecast was for heavy rain to arrive at 11 am (and it was already almost 10 am), so this would need to be a short activation.

Mike 2E0YYY was also out testing a new radio, and I was hoping to get set up and running before he had to leave his (GMA) summit in the UK, and indeed that’s how it worked out. For me, once I was parked at the trail head, inside the park, I only needed to put the antenna on the car roof and plug in the DC cable to the 8Ah LiFePO4 battery that I had brought with me.

After working Mike, who had switched to a backup radio as the new radio was unfortunately giving problems, I spotted to the POTA website and slowly got some contacts into the log. as is often the case in these activations, I would get two or three stations and then no one as the band (20 metres)= changed, eventually I managed 12 contacts and was able to pack up and go and collect my wife from the cafe where she was keeping warm on the lake front. Just as we arrived home, the rain started.

So a short activation, but a nice spot (but it may get busy at the weekend and is only served by a single track road) and another new park for me in my activation logs.

There was no extreme DX in this activation; however, two separate stations from different Canary Islands in Africa were not a bad result.

Photos: