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625 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.

625 viewsToday we activated the Otting Wildlife Management Area US-7913 down on the south end of Lookout Mountain. This 700 acre site is not often activated and usually then only by folks trying to activate as many GA parks as possible. They make 12-15 contacts then move on to the next park on their list. Today between the three of us we made 177 contacts. That's the most from anyone since we were last there in February last year.

For today Danny AG4DW made 56 contacts on 10 bands (Yes ten bands) he also made 18 Park to Park contacts which gives him his 'KILO' for P2P contacts. 23 of his contacts were DX today with 33 from the US. Allen KN4FKS made 60 contacts mostly on 20 meters SSB with 21 P2P and four Canadian contacts. John KB4QXI stayed on 40 meters and made 61 contacts with 3 P2p contacts.

Danny helped out some rock climber folks who had somehow wound up at the wrong WMA on GA Hwy 157. He set them straight and on their way to the Zahnd WMA further north on 157. Zahnd is a popular rock climbing site.

The cool thing about the OTTING WMA is some unique ancient artwork. In a rock outcrop on the area are several areas with faint but recognizable petroglyphs created by early native Americans about 1000 years ago. Before the Cherokee, Before the Creeks, before the Coosa. I have attached a photo of one scorpion drawing found here. There is also a video which shows many of the petroglyphs. link here,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qn-n0rR6fy0

It is amazing the treasures that abound in these "parks" we visit and play radio in.

624 viewsThis Thursday we activated Johns Mountain WMA US-3758 from the Overlook site.

Allen KN4FKS set up his end fed half wave sloper antenna under the trees and Dan K2DTS warmed it up first. He made 20 contacts on 20 meters SSB. the band was wonky and contacts were either long or close. He had one in Alabama and one in California. Allen then used the same rig to make 21 contacts on 20 meters SSB with 7 P2P and 3 DX contacts which included a park to park in Bermuda before the rains came.

Danny AG4DW cranked up his rig using a vertical antenna and made 4 SSB contacts, 25 FT8 contacts and 2 FM contacts. With the two FM contacts on the 1.25 m band he accomplished a rather hard to get POTA award. The POTA N1CC award is obtained by making contacts on TEN bands in TEN different parks. He is the first of our crew to get this award, congratulations on all the hard work. John KB4QXI made 20 contacts on 20 meters with 16 P2P contacts and 2 Canadian DX contacts.

The drive up the gravel road to the overlook is rough as usual but the mountain laurel bushes were in full bloom and made the trip a bit more bearable.

We seem to be in a springtime rain shower loop as every week we seem to be taking down antennas in the rain. Luckily none of the radio equipment has gotten wet. However antennas, coax and throw string need to be dried before the next activation. Hopefully the next activation will be a dry one.

Again, congrats to Danny on the award.

622 viewsThis weekend April 5-6, 2025 saw the 3rd annual Georgia State Parks POTA Contest . The goal here is to have ALL of the Georgia State Parks activated at once in a contest format. Cloudland Canyon State Park US-2169 was activated by Allen KN4FKS and John KB4QXI from Cabin 7. They set up antennas and stations on Friday evening and got ready for the contest start at 8:00 am Saturday morning.

Through the weekend Allen operated exclusively on 20 meters and John stayed on 40 meters. Band pass filters saved the day with such close proximity RF.

Bright and early Saturday both operators were ready at the start. You could not buy a contact on 20 meters! The band was dead. The sun had burped. After calling CQ for 45 minutes Allen suddenly got an answer from Arizona. He said I was the ONLY signal on his band scope. Ouch. Another few minutes and a DX contact to Columbia was made then the calls started to trickle in. It was 2 contacts the first hour, then 7 more the second hour. By the end of the third hour the 20 meter total was 20 QSO's. It slowly got better and when the day was done Allen had a total of 376 contacts. John was having similar difficulty on 40 meters. He had 143 contacts on the day, We shut down the stations at 10 pm. to get some sleep and be ready to go again Sunday morning.

During the day several fellow hams came by. Harry N4VQ stopped in with his K-9 buddy. Danny AG4DW stopped by to provide adult supervision then went across the park and set up his station giving us Park-to-Park contacts. He cranked out 25 contacts and called it a day. Dean KK4EB an old friend of both John and Allen stopped in and set up on the picnic table out in the yard. He operated on 15 meters and made 81 contacts total, 31 DX and one Georgia P2P .

Allen was awakened Sunday morning by a thunderclap at 6:30 AM. Jumping up he quickly detached both stations coax from the antennas. It was raining heavily and the thunder rolled across the ridge top. Not a good beginning to the second day of the contest. Check out time for the cabin was noon so the morning was tough. Between storm fronts Allen got on the air for a few minutes and quickly got 34 contacts before having to shut down again.

Totals for the weekend Allen Had 410 contacts with 69 P2P calls and only one Georgia park contact for a contest score of 413. John had 187 total contacts, 44 P2P contacts and 31 Georgia P2P contacts which adds 155 points to his 187 for a rough score of 342.

To cap off a fun weekend of solar and terrestrial weather, packing up to leave in the rain was fun. Antenna demobilization with occasional thunder was exciting as well as wet. Then moving all the stuff out to the cars it was just as wet. Fun weekend in spite of all the challenges. Now to dry everything out.

Alan W4PLP activated Unicoi State Park. How was your weekend? Anyone else get out to POTA?

621 viewsThis Thursday we activated Johns Mountain WMA US-3758 from the Overlook site.

Allen KN4FKS set up his end fed half wave sloper antenna under the trees and Dan K2DTS warmed it up first. He made 20 contacts on 20 meters SSB. the band was wonky and contacts were either long or close. He had one in Alabama and one in California. Allen then used the same rig to make 21 contacts on 20 meters SSB with 7 P2P and 3 DX contacts which included a park to park in Bermuda before the rains came.

Danny AG4DW cranked up his rig using a vertical antenna and made 4 SSB contacts, 25 FT8 contacts and 2 FM contacts. With the two FM contacts on the 1.25 m band he accomplished a rather hard to get POTA award. The POTA N1CC award is obtained by making contacts on TEN bands in TEN different parks. He is the first of our crew to get this award, congratulations on all the hard work. John KB4QXI made 20 contacts on 20 meters with 16 P2P contacts and 2 Canadian DX contacts.

The drive up the gravel road to the overlook is rough as usual but the mountain laurel bushes were in full bloom and made the trip a bit more bearable.

We seem to be in a springtime rain shower loop as every week we seem to be taking down antennas in the rain. Luckily none of the radio equipment has gotten wet. However antennas, coax and throw string need to be dried before the next activation. Hopefully the next activation will be a dry one.

Again, congrats to Danny on the award.

620 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.

619 viewsThis past Thursday was 'one of those days'. The activation site was the Chickamauga Battlefield US-0716 using the Cravens House site on the front slope of Lookout Mountain. This site overlooks downtown Chattanooga and is a convenient spot to activate for many of the crew. The terrestrial weather started out cloudy and overcast but later cleared to a mostly sunny day.

John KB4QXI could not come because he had to wait at home for a package delivery. Ed KM6UTC stopped by but then had to leave to also go wait for a package to be delivered. Dave KQ4GLQ came and he and Allen KN4FKS worked setting up the N3FJP logging software on his new computer to work easily with POTA activations. Then Dave got a phone call from his boss and was off to Nashville for work. Danny AG4DW was traveling to grandkids graduation. Dan K2DTS was available for a short while so he set up his mag mount ham stick and gave it a go. Allen KN4FKS set up his vertical over near the old park ranger residence.

The space weather went from bad to worse. Band conditions were dismal. Dan had one contact when he had to leave. Allen chased parks and called CQ on several bands and after 3 hours had 13 contacts. At that point you couldn't buy a contact. So I enjoyed the view for a bit, talked to several park visitors about ham radio and packed it up and went home. POTA even on a horrible day is still fun and I look at it this way, I didn't have to stress over working a chaotic pile up.

618 viewsOn Tuesday May 27 Danny AG4DW and Allen KN4FKS headed towards Cartersville to activate three parks they had never activated before. A day moving from multiple parks is called a "Rove".

The plan was to start at Etowah Indian Mounds State Historic Site US-3715. After an early drive they arrived at the park at 10 am and set up two stations. Allen set up his end fed sloper wire and made 20 contacts on 20 meters. 6 were Park to Park contacts. Danny had started on 40 meters and it was not producing contacts. He made a few FT8 Contacts then moved to 20 meters when Allen was clear. He had 14 contacts with 9 SSB and 5 FT8 contacts. It was a new experience to set up, make a few contacts then take everything down and prepare to move to the next park. It just didn't feel right. But that was the plan.

Next was Allatoona Pass Battlefield State Historic Site US-7471. This Civil War site is a very small site with a small parking lot next to a busy road, and very noisy powerlines. We set Danny's vertical up on top of the adjacent berm with Lake Allatoona on the other side. Using Danny's rig we worked through the noise, shared the radio and Allen made 17 contacts, with 7 P2P contacts on 20 meters. Danny made 14 contacts on SSB. Handing the microphone back and forth saying 'standby for a second operator' was another new experience and again it just didn't feel right. But it worked and we both got an activation. At this site we had a lot of interaction with people walking by. We would take a moment to explain what we were doing "It's not CB" Many had a relative or friend who was into Ham radio. The 'Parks ON The Air' concept was interesting and exciting to all of them. We packed up the gear, then spent a few minutes walking past the monuments and interpretive signage to explore the battlefield site.

Then it was on to Red Top Mountain State Park US-2194. We used the large empty parking lot at group shelter 2 as our base. After a quick lunch we used Danny's radio and Allen's end fed wire antenna. to set up on 20 meters. Again sharing the radio Allen made 12 contacts with 11 P2P. and Danny made a quick 10 contacts. We could hear the static crashes on the radio and the sky was getting darker. A few drops fell so Danny deployed his "sun shade' umbrella to cover the tail gate where we had the rig set up. About the time we both had the 10 contacts required for a successful activation the rain was beginning to fall. As we quickly began to take everything down it began to rain harder, About the time we jumped in the truck it began to pour.

The drive up the interstate from Cartersville to Resaca was exciting to say the least. The rain was hard and at one place the fast lane was not draining and had about a foot of standing water. This was causing cars to spin out into the median, bang into each other and drown out their engines Several state troopers were on the shoulder working fender benders. Somehow Danny was able to safely get us through the mayhem and on up the road.

It was a fun day, very different and challenging at times. We each added three new parks to our list of sites we have activated. Maybe one day we'll both qualify for some obscure POTA certificate :-)

618 viewsWe activated Cloudland Canyon State Park US-2169 on Thursday May 29. We set up in the picnic shed on top of the hill at the highest point on the park next to the disc golf course. It wasn't raining when we set up but it certainly was when we were taking down.

Allen KN4FKS set up his new 25 foot tall Chameleon vertical and made a fairly quick 35 contacts on 20 meters. Then moved to 17 meters and slowed down a bit to make 19 contacts. Then moved to 40 meters to make 3 contacts. for a total of 57 contacts with 7 park to park contacts with 2 DX contacts, Mexico and Canada. The bands were wonky with signals coming and going or just non existent. The sun burped once more.

Danny AG4DW set up his elevated radial POTA performer vertical and made a total of 73 contacts, 47 on SSB, with 10 P2P contacts then 25 contacts on FT8 all on 40 meters, he then retuned and made 1 contact on 30 meters. Dan K2DTS used his mag mount HamStick and made 27 contacts on 20 meters, 16 SSB, 6 FT8, and 4 FT4.

Notable contacts on the day was first the US aircraft carrier USS Lexington W5LEX was hunting parks and gave me a call. Then later a booming signal 'park to park' came and it was David WK4DS calling from the Ascalon Trailhead in the same Cloudland Canyon Park property. He was probably two miles away. Then the next contact was in Washington state. \

The bands were odd short and then long. Did I mention it rained? I haven't packed away dry gear in over a month. I'm ready for some sunshine. Regardless a fun time was had by all.

617 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.

614 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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