SOTA ON/ON-001

21 avril 2009

Hello friends!

I’m starting this blog about radioamateur subjects with my first sota expedition.

This include the preparation, the travel, the expedition and all related details (hope funy ones).

I’ve done some pictures to illustrate the complete story so … enjoy!

Preparation

The purpose here is to stay qrp at all levels as you will see further in the sota preparation:

1. protect my ic-703. The used material will take space in my bag but I’m sure about the efficiency of the solution

2. protect the lead-acid battery using a taylor made appel juice box & check voltage:

3.check the mast and lines in the garden:

4.the final bag:

additional devices like:

gps,
compas, camera, gsm (ok i know), region maps, food and water, v/uHF
th-f7e, watch, logbook, pencil, THE MICRPHONE – I was ready to leave
without it…

Choosing the summit:

Several summits are available and mainly located in the same place in Belgium.

to be continued …

24 avril

I
finally choose to start with the first summit on the Belgian summits
list [see sota.org site]: the ON/ON-001 (le petite Hesse).
The summit is located in the south-east part of Belgium in a place called "Les hautes Fagnes".
With an altitude of 690 meters and 8 sota points per activation this will be my first sota experience.

For the weather: 17° Celcius, sun and some rare clouds, some wind but globaly the meteo is with me.
On the way to the summit:

Found a nice place with less trees

Let’s start with the portable installation:

My small buddy for the field day! very curious and so popular )

A last closeup and let’s start with the SOTA activation:

let’s go on the 40m band:

more than 30 contacts have been made in +- 3 hours I guess I’m lucky for my first SOTA

logbook of my first sota (utc):

22/04/2009	09:57	F5LMH	7065
22/04/2009	10:19	M0IOC	7065
22/04/2009	10:42	G1WAP	7082
22/04/2009	11:00	G3NQX	7082
22/04/2009	11:04	DM2AOC	7082
22/04/2009	11:37	2E0GMW/M	7088,65
22/04/2009	11:40	G6APD	7088,65
22/04/2009	12:27	OM1AX	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:36	ON6DSL	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:40	G6WRW	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:41	G0TDM	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:42	F4FSV	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:43	G30HC	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:44	G0RQL	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:45	OK2BDR	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:46	G4GRG	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:46	S51ZG	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:47	9A2N	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:48	G0NUP	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:50	9A7W	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:52	GW7AAV	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:52	G1XNK	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:53	G6WRW	7057,3
22/04/2009	12:55	G6L2B	7057,3
22/04/2009	13:07	M3RHJ	7057,3
22/04/2009	13:08	G0NES	7057,3
22/04/2009	13:09	OK1OAV	7057,3
22/04/2009	13:14	IZ0ARL	7057,3
22/04/2009	13:18	S56IHX	7057,3
22/04/2009	13:18	HA5MA	7057,3
22/04/2009	13:21	M0BZZ	7057,3

Thanks to Vlad OM1AX, I’ve been "clusterized" and started my first pileup on 7053.3.
Vlad also serves as a gateway to contact ON6DSL that was under QRM, ON6DSL is one of our major Belgian SOTA activator (Hi Luc !)

A wanted to thanks all stations I’ve contacted this day and hope to contact them soon for another SOTA !

73! & 88 to G6WRW
ON3BCM
Emmanuel