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88 viewsWe activated J. 'Sloppy' Floyd State Park US-2187 on Thursday Jan. 30 2025 from the lower lake site. The terrestrial weather was mild with mostly cloudy skies and only about 10 drops of rain at one time. The space weather cooperated as well and we all had a good day.
Allen KN4FKS rigged the end fed wire as a sloper and used the trusty old ICOM 706 MKIIG to run 100 watts. 20 meters SSB was active as usual and 71 contacts were made in short order. !5 P2P contacts and one Canadian contact. During the almost constant pile up I heard a partial of KC3 so came back with 'KC3go ahead' had another pile. To my amazement I had FOUR folks with prefix of KC3 calling me. Never had that happen before. John KB4QXI had a logging computer issue and had to work through that. Once he got set up with his Hamstick and YAESU 891 he went to work on 20 meters SSB making 87 contacts with 18 P2P and 3 Canadians. Danny AG4DW worked 15 meters and had 9 SSB contacts and 30 FT8 contacts. He had 15 DX contacts.to Canada, EH9 Ceuta & Melilla (a part of Spain in N. Africa) Columbia, Germany, France, Hawaii, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland.
Also in other POTA news this week on Wednesday John KB4QXI went to Pigeon Mtn. US-3742 and made his 3,000th contact as an activator on that area. A TRIPPLE KILO ! Also as a POTA 'hunter' Allen KN4FKS has now contacted 2,000 distinct parks. So now he has a DOUBLE KILO as a hunter.
Hunting from the home shack or activating from a nearby park POTA has Ham radio fun for everyone.
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101 viewsWe gathered today at Red Clay State Historic Park (US-2970), in Bradley County, Tennessee, which is also the origin point of the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail (US-3791).
It started off as a quiet day in the park but it wasn't too long before two school buses pulled into the Visitor Center and several dozen young kids disembarked. The buses then chose our area around the picnic pavilion to park their buses. Ed Dionne (KM6UTC) had set up in his car next to the picnic pavilion but he wound up getting sort of sandwiched in between the two buses and wisely chose to move to a different area. It was then that Ed realized that he had a low tire on his Range Rover but we managed to get it resolved and Ed worked mostly FT8 and some SSB out of his vehicle and had 41 contacts, including two DX QSO's, and five park-to-park QSO's!
Dan Strickland (K2DTS) set up his POTA Performer antenna at one of the picnic tables and worked SSB, mostly on 20 meters and had 31 contacts! (Dan also worked Chickamauga Battery last Thursday and had 32 SSB contacts.)
Danny Wooten (AG4DW) set out with a plan to activate on as many bands as possible to achieve 10 bands in both parks! Before the end of the day the goal was reached and he had a total of 38 FT8 HF QSO's, including 3 DX calls to Saint Barthelemy, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, and 3 FM calls and worked total of 9 bands.
Band conditions were a little tough on SSB today but the terrestrial weather was perfect, except for the very thorough coating of yellow pollen on, well, EVERYTHING! All in all, though, a very, very good day doing POTA in a fairly busy, but beautiful park!
Oh, and around lunchtime the dozens and dozens of schoolchildren descended on the picnic pavilion above us and we all had visions of wild kids running all around and tripping over our cords and knocking over all of our antenna! Much to our surprise, these kids we well behaved and well supervised (unlike us) and caused no problems at all! Kudos to the teachers and helpers that were in charge of that group of very well behaved kids!
POTA On!
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99 viewsWe activated Pigeon Mountain WMA US-3742 this Thursday June 5 2025. We set up at the South Brow road site. Without an audience I am deadly accurate with my arborist throw bag putting a string up over a high limb to set up the end fed halfwave wire antenna. If anybody else had been there and watching it would have taken six throws.
After getting set up I quickly made several Park to Park contacts on 20 meters SSB. Danny AG4DW arrives and was followed soon thereafter by the DNR area manager in his big tractor and mower. Luckily my sloper antenna was just high enough to clear the tractor cab to allow him access to the field he was to mow.
Danny set up his Pota Performer vertical antenna and made 15 SSB contacts on 40 meters then 8 FT8 contacts on that band as well. He shifted to 15 meters FT8 and made 17 more contacts bringing his total for the day to 50 contacts with two DX contacts 1 to Spain and 1 to the Dominican Republic.
Allen KN4FKS finished the day with 60 contacts on 20 meters SSB with 20 Park to Park contacts and just to Canadians for DX. So after 70 activations Allen is approaching a triple KILO for Pigeon Mountain WMA current total is 2941 leaving only 59 to go.
The South Brow site is nice and shady and being on top of the mountain our antennas are certainly high. Before we left the DNR Game Warden guy stopped by and we chatted with him for a while. Nice fellow. The view from the Hood Overlook on the way out was a bit hazy but still impressive. Another fun day in the big woods doing POTA!
Dan K2DTS couldn't make it to Pigeon Mountain Thursday but was able to sneak in a quick activation at the Chickamauga Battlefield US-0716. In the hour he had he set up made 2 SSB and 8 FT8 contacts for a successful activation with 2 DX contacts to Cuba and Canada. He then packed everything away and was only there for an hour. We are blessed with lots of easily accessible parks near us.
On Friday John KB4QXI was in Helen GA for a meeting and eased down to Hardman Farm State Historic Site US-3718 and fighting local QRN made 25 quick SSB contacts on 20 meters. He gave up when the noise floor exceeded S-9 level. Sometimes noise just jumps up and bites you. Especially at some parks, RV power inverters, noisy solar panels, LED parking lot lights, etc.
Anyway fun was had for a while and that's what POTA is about.
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152 viewsWe gathered today at Red Clay State Historic Park (US-2970), in Bradley County, Tennessee, which is also the origin point of the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail (US-3791).
It started off as a quiet day in the park but it wasn't too long before two school buses pulled into the Visitor Center and several dozen young kids disembarked. The buses then chose our area around the picnic pavilion to park their buses. Ed Dionne (KM6UTC) had set up in his car next to the picnic pavilion but he wound up getting sort of sandwiched in between the two buses and wisely chose to move to a different area. It was then that Ed realized that he had a low tire on his Range Rover but we managed to get it resolved and Ed worked mostly FT8 and some SSB out of his vehicle and had 41 contacts, including two DX QSO's, and five park-to-park QSO's!
Dan Strickland (K2DTS) set up his POTA Performer antenna at one of the picnic tables and worked SSB, mostly on 20 meters and had 31 contacts! (Dan also worked Chickamauga Battery last Thursday and had 32 SSB contacts.)
Danny Wooten (AG4DW) set out with a plan to activate on as many bands as possible to achieve 10 bands in both parks! Before the end of the day the goal was reached and he had a total of 38 FT8 HF QSO's, including 3 DX calls to Saint Barthelemy, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, and 3 FM calls and worked total of 9 bands.
Band conditions were a little tough on SSB today but the terrestrial weather was perfect, except for the very thorough coating of yellow pollen on, well, EVERYTHING! All in all, though, a very, very good day doing POTA in a fairly busy, but beautiful park!
Oh, and around lunchtime the dozens and dozens of schoolchildren descended on the picnic pavilion above us and we all had visions of wild kids running all around and tripping over our cords and knocking over all of our antenna! Much to our surprise, these kids we well behaved and well supervised (unlike us) and caused no problems at all! Kudos to the teachers and helpers that were in charge of that group of very well behaved kids!
POTA On!
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0 viewsEver have an itch and the need to scratch it? After I realized last week that I was 18 QSO's from a POTA double Kilo for Cloudland Canyon State Park US-2169 and that itch has been driving me crazy. So this morning I decided to head to the Ascalon Trailhead and scratch the itch.
Trying to get an early start to avoid the heat but it was still already warm when I arrived at the park. The throw string went exactly where I aimed it (there was no audience) and I quickly got the end fed wire antenna up. I got everything set up opened the computer and got the log all ready. I found an open frequency and spotted myself on the POTA page. 14.263 on 20 meters SSB. I called CQ for a bit and wondered where everyone was. I wondered if everything was connected then I looked at the radio display. I was on 7.263 40 meters. No wonder the spot wasn't bringing in the contacts. I quickly changed bands and there was Danny AG4DW giving me a call. So now I had the first QSO out of the 17 I needed. Being on the right band helped and contacts rolled in steadily and I easily made the 17 for the 2xKilo. I kept calling CQ and had to move once due to QRM but wound up with a total of 60 contacts with 7 Park To Park contacts and the only DX was two Canadians. By 11 am it was beginning to get hot the breeze had died so I called it a day and headed home early. The itch has been scratched so now I can concentrate on Field Day.
In June of 2017 I heard about this group doing a Ham radio thing 'Field Day' using the old 'command bus' set up at Walker Fire Rescue Station 1 in Rock Spring. It was a while after supper and I dropped in to find Jody Carter and Alan Painter still on the air. They took the time to introduce me to Ham radio and explain what I needed to do to get licensed. At the club meeting in August I took the Technician and General test and was soon on the air. The rest is history. So I will always have a special place in my heart for field day. See everyone Saturday.
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108 viewsWe activated Pigeon Mountain WMA US-3742 this Thursday June 5 2025. We set up at the South Brow road site. Without an audience I am deadly accurate with my arborist throw bag putting a string up over a high limb to set up the end fed halfwave wire antenna. If anybody else had been there and watching it would have taken six throws.
After getting set up I quickly made several Park to Park contacts on 20 meters SSB. Danny AG4DW arrives and was followed soon thereafter by the DNR area manager in his big tractor and mower. Luckily my sloper antenna was just high enough to clear the tractor cab to allow him access to the field he was to mow.
Danny set up his Pota Performer vertical antenna and made 15 SSB contacts on 40 meters then 8 FT8 contacts on that band as well. He shifted to 15 meters FT8 and made 17 more contacts bringing his total for the day to 50 contacts with two DX contacts 1 to Spain and 1 to the Dominican Republic.
Allen KN4FKS finished the day with 60 contacts on 20 meters SSB with 20 Park to Park contacts and just to Canadians for DX. So after 70 activations Allen is approaching a triple KILO for Pigeon Mountain WMA current total is 2941 leaving only 59 to go.
The South Brow site is nice and shady and being on top of the mountain our antennas are certainly high. Before we left the DNR Game Warden guy stopped by and we chatted with him for a while. Nice fellow. The view from the Hood Overlook on the way out was a bit hazy but still impressive. Another fun day in the big woods doing POTA!
Dan K2DTS couldn't make it to Pigeon Mountain Thursday but was able to sneak in a quick activation at the Chickamauga Battlefield US-0716. In the hour he had he set up made 2 SSB and 8 FT8 contacts for a successful activation with 2 DX contacts to Cuba and Canada. He then packed everything away and was only there for an hour. We are blessed with lots of easily accessible parks near us.
On Friday John KB4QXI was in Helen GA for a meeting and eased down to Hardman Farm State Historic Site US-3718 and fighting local QRN made 25 quick SSB contacts on 20 meters. He gave up when the noise floor exceeded S-9 level. Sometimes noise just jumps up and bites you. Especially at some parks, RV power inverters, noisy solar panels, LED parking lot lights, etc.
Anyway fun was had for a while and that's what POTA is about.
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96 viewsWe gathered today at Red Clay State Historic Park (US-2970), in Bradley County, Tennessee, which is also the origin point of the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail (US-3791).
It started off as a quiet day in the park but it wasn't too long before two school buses pulled into the Visitor Center and several dozen young kids disembarked. The buses then chose our area around the picnic pavilion to park their buses. Ed Dionne (KM6UTC) had set up in his car next to the picnic pavilion but he wound up getting sort of sandwiched in between the two buses and wisely chose to move to a different area. It was then that Ed realized that he had a low tire on his Range Rover but we managed to get it resolved and Ed worked mostly FT8 and some SSB out of his vehicle and had 41 contacts, including two DX QSO's, and five park-to-park QSO's!
Dan Strickland (K2DTS) set up his POTA Performer antenna at one of the picnic tables and worked SSB, mostly on 20 meters and had 31 contacts! (Dan also worked Chickamauga Battery last Thursday and had 32 SSB contacts.)
Danny Wooten (AG4DW) set out with a plan to activate on as many bands as possible to achieve 10 bands in both parks! Before the end of the day the goal was reached and he had a total of 38 FT8 HF QSO's, including 3 DX calls to Saint Barthelemy, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, and 3 FM calls and worked total of 9 bands.
Band conditions were a little tough on SSB today but the terrestrial weather was perfect, except for the very thorough coating of yellow pollen on, well, EVERYTHING! All in all, though, a very, very good day doing POTA in a fairly busy, but beautiful park!
Oh, and around lunchtime the dozens and dozens of schoolchildren descended on the picnic pavilion above us and we all had visions of wild kids running all around and tripping over our cords and knocking over all of our antenna! Much to our surprise, these kids we well behaved and well supervised (unlike us) and caused no problems at all! Kudos to the teachers and helpers that were in charge of that group of very well behaved kids!
POTA On!
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117 viewsIt has been a busy POTA week.
The week started with John KB4QXI activating Chattahoochee Bend State Park US-2168 on Sunday. He made 34 contacts with 7 P2P and 3 DX contacts.
Then on Tuesday Allen KN4FKS activated J. Sloppy Floyd State Park US-2187. He made 97 contacts with 41 P2P and 12 DX contacts.
On Wednesday John KB4QXI and Danny AG4DW activated the Zahnd WMA US-7903. John made 33 Contacts with 15 P2P and2 DX. Danny made 17 contacts with 1 DX contact.
On Thursday the crew gathered at Cloudland Canyon State Park, Nick A Jack trailhead to activate US-2169. Allen KN4FKS operated mostly on 40 meters SSB and made 64 contacts with 16 P2P on a total of seven bands, 40,15, 80, 6. 2, 1.25, 70cm.
Dan K2DTS made 15 contacts with all of them being P2P contacts. John KB4QXI made a total of 113 contacts, 10 on 15m SSB and the rest on 20m SSB. He had 30 P2P contacts and 6 DX. Danny AG4DW had 50 contacts, 10 SSB and the rest FT8 with 11 DX contacts. Danny also participated in the multi band effort. He is leading the pack in the POTA N1CC award ( N1CC is making contacts on ten bands in ten different parks )
Lots of peanut butter and jelly was consumed and all had a fun time on difficult bands this week.
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102 viewsWe activated Chickamauga Battlefield US-0716 yesterday at the Wilder Recreation Field site. This is on the West side of the park and was the front line on the third day of the battle. A dozen deer wandered across the field in front of us and the sun actually made it right pleasant.
As we gathered we agreed to a band plan as to who would be operating on which band. Then it was set up time. Allen KN4FKS and Danny AG4DW decided to utilize the nearby picnic tables and set their vertical antennas on opposite sides. Ed KM6UTC set up in the back seat of his vehicle. Dan K2DTS was on the far end of the parking lot and when John KB4QXI got there he also set up in the front of the parking lot.
Allen chased Park to Park contacts on 20 meters SSB and needed 20 P2P's to make a double Kilo ( 2000 ) P2P POTA award. with 21 made it was a successful day. Danny cranked up on 15 Meters, caught a band opening and worked DX into Belgium, Canada, England, Germany, France, Italy, Sweden, Hawaii, and Mexico. He had a total of 104 contacts with 46 SSB and 58 FT8 all on 15 meters. Ed worked 10 meters and had 46 FT8 contacts with 22 of those being DX. Dan worked the WARC bands of 12 & 17 meters and I don't know his totals. John worked 40 meters and had 26 contacts with 4 P2P.
A fun day was had by all, there were lots of park visitors coming by and one cyclist chatted and his father, SK now was a Ham back in the 50's he could even remember his call sign. In the attached photos we utilized the latest model of line gun to get antennas set. Hi Hi.
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75 viewsWe activated Chickamauga Battlefield US-0716 yesterday at the Wilder Recreation Field site. This is on the West side of the park and was the front line on the third day of the battle. A dozen deer wandered across the field in front of us and the sun actually made it right pleasant.
As we gathered we agreed to a band plan as to who would be operating on which band. Then it was set up time. Allen KN4FKS and Danny AG4DW decided to utilize the nearby picnic tables and set their vertical antennas on opposite sides. Ed KM6UTC set up in the back seat of his vehicle. Dan K2DTS was on the far end of the parking lot and when John KB4QXI got there he also set up in the front of the parking lot.
Allen chased Park to Park contacts on 20 meters SSB and needed 20 P2P's to make a double Kilo ( 2000 ) P2P POTA award. with 21 made it was a successful day. Danny cranked up on 15 Meters, caught a band opening and worked DX into Belgium, Canada, England, Germany, France, Italy, Sweden, Hawaii, and Mexico. He had a total of 104 contacts with 46 SSB and 58 FT8 all on 15 meters. Ed worked 10 meters and had 46 FT8 contacts with 22 of those being DX. Dan worked the WARC bands of 12 & 17 meters and I don't know his totals. John worked 40 meters and had 26 contacts with 4 P2P.
A fun day was had by all, there were lots of park visitors coming by and one cyclist chatted and his father, SK now was a Ham back in the 50's he could even remember his call sign. In the attached photos we utilized the latest model of line gun to get antennas set. Hi Hi.
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90 viewsWe activated Chickamauga Battlefield US-0716 yesterday at the Wilder Recreation Field site. This is on the West side of the park and was the front line on the third day of the battle. A dozen deer wandered across the field in front of us and the sun actually made it right pleasant.
As we gathered we agreed to a band plan as to who would be operating on which band. Then it was set up time. Allen KN4FKS and Danny AG4DW decided to utilize the nearby picnic tables and set their vertical antennas on opposite sides. Ed KM6UTC set up in the back seat of his vehicle. Dan K2DTS was on the far end of the parking lot and when John KB4QXI got there he also set up in the front of the parking lot.
Allen chased Park to Park contacts on 20 meters SSB and needed 20 P2P's to make a double Kilo ( 2000 ) P2P POTA award. with 21 made it was a successful day. Danny cranked up on 15 Meters, caught a band opening and worked DX into Belgium, Canada, England, Germany, France, Italy, Sweden, Hawaii, and Mexico. He had a total of 104 contacts with 46 SSB and 58 FT8 all on 15 meters. Ed worked 10 meters and had 46 FT8 contacts with 22 of those being DX. Dan worked the WARC bands of 12 & 17 meters and I don't know his totals. John worked 40 meters and had 26 contacts with 4 P2P.
A fun day was had by all, there were lots of park visitors coming by and one cyclist chatted and his father, SK now was a Ham back in the 50's he could even remember his call sign. In the attached photos we utilized the latest model of line gun to get antennas set. Hi Hi.
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91 viewsWe activated Chickamauga Battlefield US-0716 yesterday at the Wilder Recreation Field site. This is on the West side of the park and was the front line on the third day of the battle. A dozen deer wandered across the field in front of us and the sun actually made it right pleasant.
As we gathered we agreed to a band plan as to who would be operating on which band. Then it was set up time. Allen KN4FKS and Danny AG4DW decided to utilize the nearby picnic tables and set their vertical antennas on opposite sides. Ed KM6UTC set up in the back seat of his vehicle. Dan K2DTS was on the far end of the parking lot and when John KB4QXI got there he also set up in the front of the parking lot.
Allen chased Park to Park contacts on 20 meters SSB and needed 20 P2P's to make a double Kilo ( 2000 ) P2P POTA award. with 21 made it was a successful day. Danny cranked up on 15 Meters, caught a band opening and worked DX into Belgium, Canada, England, Germany, France, Italy, Sweden, Hawaii, and Mexico. He had a total of 104 contacts with 46 SSB and 58 FT8 all on 15 meters. Ed worked 10 meters and had 46 FT8 contacts with 22 of those being DX. Dan worked the WARC bands of 12 & 17 meters and I don't know his totals. John worked 40 meters and had 26 contacts with 4 P2P.
A fun day was had by all, there were lots of park visitors coming by and one cyclist chatted and his father, SK now was a Ham back in the 50's he could even remember his call sign. In the attached photos we utilized the latest model of line gun to get antennas set. Hi Hi.
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