 Most viewed - Parks on the Air |
422 views5-25-2022, I activated the Dahlonega Gold Museum K-7456. To set up radios I set my vertical antenna in the grass half way between the building and the street. The radio and tuner were placed on a low brick wall and that was my operating position. Got on the air on 20 meters and had a noise floor of S-7 to 8. Made 13 contacts with 1 P2P and 2 DX (Spain, Canada) before I had to go QRT because it was about to rain. With all the passers by and tourist I spent a fair bit of time explaining what I was doing.
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POTA 2022-07-21, Desoto State Park K-1039 in Alabama422 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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422 views2023-05-03 - For POTA this week we activated Johns Mtn. WMA K-3758 today from the Johns Mountain Overlook site. This spot is off Pocket Road in Vilanow, 2 miles up a gravel forest service road to the parking lot with an amazing view to the West. On a clear day you can see into Alabama and Tennessee from there.
Getting set up first involves throwing a line into a nearby tree to hoist one end of a simple end fed Half Wave antenna. Then set up the portable station, today it was my old ICOM IC-706 MkII G with a MFJ tuner running off a 15 Amp hour Goal Zero battery. For log keeping I use a really cheap Walmart computer running N3FJP software. Today Tony WA4TW ran the log and I did the calling. The goal today was to get 57 contacts to get my POTA KILO award for making 1,000 contacts from a single park.
I got 66 contacts so the Kilo was made! After a long lunch sitting in the sun Tony got on the air and made a quick 12 contacts with 9 Park to Park contacts. John KB4QXI showed up late and used his Hamstick antenna on top of the car to get his activation in. It was a windy day at the overlook and band noise was rough on 20 meters but everything worked out for a fun day.
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422 viewsWe activated Booker T. Washington State Park TN K-2933 yesterday Thursday Nov 30 2023. It turned out to be a wonderful weather day in a really nice park. The park is one of those reminders of a segregated past. Now used by everyone we had a great time. For the activation we established four stations. Peter KX4BE worked CW on 12 m and 15m using the 'screwdriver' antenna on his van. Danny AG4DW worked FT8 mostly on 10 meters. One SSB contact was a park to park contact in England. He had a total of 26 contacts, for DX he also had 2 Brazil, Spain, Netherlands, and Canada. Danny used his elevated vertical antenna set up. Tony WA4TW worked 20 meters SSB with his Chameleon vertical and had 50 contacts with 9 P2P and 2 Canadians. After Tony got 50 QSO's Allen took over the rig and made 21 contacts also on 20 meters with 3 P2P's and 3 Canadians. After Allen Fred KQ4JXX took over and made 12 contacts on 20 meters SSB with 3 P2P's . John KB4QXI finally arrived and made 10 contacts with 2 P2P's on 40 meters using his 'Buddystick' on top of the car. Ed KM6UTC provided the needed 'Adult Supervision' necessary to keep the POTA crew out of trouble.
Band conditions were "wonky" all day signals would be strong then fade to next to nothing and suddenly be back strong in the midst of one QSO. You might see a 5-9 signal go to 4-3 on the next over then back to 5-9 mid sentence. Everyone just worked through the fading and made a successful activation. We utilized the loop road in the 'Recreation Area 2' and Pavillion 2 on top of a small hill and it made an excellent place to set up with some distance between stations yet close enough to enjoy visiting with each other We wondered about the odd layout of the hill top site.
While there the Park Ranger came by and stopped to chat. Very friendly fellow and he mentioned he had seen other folks like us in the past and wondered what it exactly was. We explained the Parks on the Air Program (gave him a brochure) then explained HAM radio in general and about our equipment. We then asked about the history of the hilltop and he said it was originally a campground, not for RV's but for tents. He also said they built a boat marina but neither were used much as back then the folks who came here didn't have a lot of boats or camping equipment. Times have changed he said. Well spoken. He then recruited us to help him with the parks Junior Ranger program next June. We'll be there whatever it takes!
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422 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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422 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?
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421 viewsChickamauga Battlefield Park - 09-19-2020
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421 viewsPOTA - Cloudland Canyon - 1-23-2021, KN4FKS
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421 views2023-05-03 - For POTA this week we activated Johns Mtn. WMA K-3758 today from the Johns Mountain Overlook site. This spot is off Pocket Road in Vilanow, 2 miles up a gravel forest service road to the parking lot with an amazing view to the West. On a clear day you can see into Alabama and Tennessee from there.
Getting set up first involves throwing a line into a nearby tree to hoist one end of a simple end fed Half Wave antenna. Then set up the portable station, today it was my old ICOM IC-706 MkII G with a MFJ tuner running off a 15 Amp hour Goal Zero battery. For log keeping I use a really cheap Walmart computer running N3FJP software. Today Tony WA4TW ran the log and I did the calling. The goal today was to get 57 contacts to get my POTA KILO award for making 1,000 contacts from a single park.
I got 66 contacts so the Kilo was made! After a long lunch sitting in the sun Tony got on the air and made a quick 12 contacts with 9 Park to Park contacts. John KB4QXI showed up late and used his Hamstick antenna on top of the car to get his activation in. It was a windy day at the overlook and band noise was rough on 20 meters but everything worked out for a fun day.
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421 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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420 viewsPOTA - 20021027 - What a great activation! Ham radio, picnic, friends, and sunset, nothing better.
Allen KN4FKS was on 17 meters SSB and had 36 contacts with 4P2P, and 4DX. John KB4QXI had quite a run on 40 meters with 102 contacts and 8 P2P. He was still busy when he went QRT for supper. Peter KX4BE was on 20 meters CW and had 68 contacts, 4 P2P, and 3 DX. Karen KX4KM had 31 contacts on 20 meter SSB with 8 P2P. Ed KM6UTC worked digital QRP on 30 meters and had 19 contacts with 1 P2P and 1 DX
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420 viewsPOTA - 20221110 - We activated Harrison Bay SP Tennessee K-2951 Thursday. Tony WA4TW had 22 contacts on 20 meters with 6 P2P’s. Allen KN4FKS worked 40 meters after lunch with 32 contacts and 2 P2P’s. Ed KM6UTC worked digital on several bands and had 44 contacts with 4 P2P’s. Peter using CW on several bands had 44 contacts with 4 P2P and 8 DX contacts in Europe. Tony and Allen made one contact over a ‘long’ distance. We made contact with a ham across the lake from us on 2m and 40m.
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