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POTA 2022-07-21, Desoto State Park K-1039 in Alabama482 viewsPOTA this week was to Desoto State Park K-1039 in Alabama. We set up in the recently renovated picnic area in the Desoto Falls portion of the park. The falls just below our operating position is right at 100 feet tall. This time of year the water flow is low but it is still impressive. We had many interested park visitors come by and Karen assisted one curious young man in making three contacts around the country. The 40 meter band was hopeless so we took turns on 20 meters.
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482 viewsOn Saturday, while a few were invited to spend time with the Ramblers, another crew of POTA operators went off to the Cherokee National Forest to activate.
This was made possible by a very cordial invitation by the Cleveland Ham Radio group and coordinated by Larry Wallace KN4JUU. Their club has a repeater at the top of Oswald Dome at an elevation of 3000’.
The drive up took us into the clouds/dense fog, where the taillights of the vehicle ahead were barely visible. My Land Rover has rear end fog lights from the factory I thought I’d never use… well they got turned on for this.
The road itself was not as in a poor condition as some may remember when heading to the Bat Cave . But it most certainly was much longer.
We arrived and set up with a variety of different radios and antennas. From that elevation even some 2m DX was easily possible.
The highlight of the day was lunch being cooked by our own Chef Boy R Jeff N2YYP. He had made up some Deer burgers the day before. Dangerous stuff! So good a person wanted to just keep eating them. Fortunately self control managed to prevail. Jeff I believe has been elected as the ‘official cook/chef’ for future adventures. I should mention there were dogs and sausages for those who didn’t want any Bambi. And also , Jeff brought some of his award winning Chow Chow. Stuff goes good on just about everything imo
Anyway, I digress. Activations went very well. What a wonderful locale to activate. Afterwards the fog had burned off, and the trip back down was simply Gorgeous! Vistas popped as we traveled down that were picture card perfect.
If the Cleveland crew ever offer the opportunity to go to their site again, I’d strongly encourage folk to take them up on it
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482 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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482 viewsPOTA from many places. This past Thursday April 17 the TSARC POTA crew activated several parks from different places.
Allen KN4FKS and John KB4QXI activated 'Sloppy' Floyd State Park US-2187 from the site near the lower lake dam. Allen had 105 contacts with 23 Park to Park contacts and 1 DX to Canada. John had 64 contacts with 28 P2P contacts and 1 DX to Mexico. Allen is now just 59 contacts away from making that 'KILO' award for Floyd SP. The KILO is awarded in recognition of making 1.000 contacts as an activator from that park.
Ed KM6UTC activated Chickamauga-Chattanooga National Battlefield US-0716 from the Cravens House site up on the slopes of Lookout Mountain overlooking downtown Chattanooga. Operating the digital mode of FT8 he made 99 contacts with lots of DX all over the world. He worked an 'EA6" station from the Balearic Islands. Do you know where that is without looking it up? Dan K2DTS had a quick activation from the Chickamauga Battlefield US-0716 by pulling onto a roadside pulloff and setting his mag mount antenna on the car. He made 20 quick contacts by simply chasing parks. So he had 20 Park to Park contacts. with 1 DX to Bermuda.
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481 viewsPOTA - Pigeon Mtn Wildlife Mgt Area - 4-8-2021, KN4FKS
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481 viewsPOTA - with the Rambler Radio Club - 5-15-2021
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481 viewsPOTA - Crockford-Pigeon Mtn. at Atwood Point - 09-23-2021
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481 viewsPOTA - 2022-08-04 -Our POTA activation today was at J. Floyd State Park near Summerville GA. John KB4QXI made 79 contacts on 40 meters. Tony WA4TW made 27 contacts with 7 P2P on 20 meters. Peter KX4BE made 53 contacts with 1 P2P on 30 meters CW. The assistant Park Manager Hope Cates came by and was very interested in our activation and visited for a while. Her father was a ham years ago so she remembered ham radio fondly. We had to quit early today as a thunderstorm came up from the south.
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481 viewsThis Thursday we activated Pigeon Mountain US-3742 from inside the check station. With rain showers all around and the hot muggy weather it was certainly nice to have air conditioning and a roof over our heads.
We set two stations and shared radios and bands. Allen, KN4FKS, started out on 20 meters with 14 contacts, 12 P2P and no DX. Peter, KX4BE, broke out the key and worked 20 meter CW and made 13 contacts with all 13 being P2P. Then John KB4QXI made 18 contacts on 20 meters. Danny, AG4DW, set up his digital rig on 15 meters and made 28 contacts on FT8. He had 4 DX contacts to: Columbia, Belize, and 2 Canadians.
Thanks to the GA DNR folks who let us use the check station to avoid the heat and rain!
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481 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.
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481 viewsIn case you have been under a rock for some time this weekend was the ARRL Field Day event. Several of us with the TSARC set up at the Cedar Grove Community Center in SW Walker County. The community center is a great location for field day with one exception. It has air conditioning a big plus, a full kitchen, lots of space to set up, a basket ball court sized big central room And did I mention air conditioning!. The one problem with the location in the valley is that it is surrounded on three sides by nearby Lookout mountain and Pigeon Mountain. So getting a signal out of this hole is difficult but doable.
We got off and running Saturday afternoon and as usual a big thunderstorm rolled in over the mountain. Quickly we disconnected antennas and watched the rain blow sideways first one direction then the other. Ed KM6UTC has his vertical antenna support tripod blow down but luckily it was not damaged. Then late Sunday morning here came another big storm so we called it quits and hurriedly got all the antennas down and everything packed away just before the storm hit once more. The timing was excellent as we had just run out of cookies to munch on. A crisis was at hand.
Field day is POTA done large and all of us have gotten lots of practice operating portable. But field day is not POTA as there were no peanut butter and jelly sandwiches.
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480 viewsJ. Floyd State Park K-2187 on 04-27-2022. We set up down by the dam of the lower lake. John KB4QXI worked 20 meters with a ham stick on the roof of his car and made 60 contacts, 4 P2P, 6 Canadians and Spain. Tony WA4TW went first on 40 meters using the End Fed Half Wave wire rigged as a sloper fed from the bottom. He made 60 contacts before lunch. After lunch Allen KN4FKS took over the microphone and Tony logged. Allen made 42 contacts with 2 P2P before the battery was almost gone at 7% remaining.
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