Here I am standing on the east face of Cannon Mountain soaking up the stunning view to the south. I was pointing to where I live just 43 miles away. You can actually see Mt. Lafayette, which is out of frame just to my left across the valley below, from the top of my street on a clear day. The roadway below is the infamous I-93 where it’s just a simple two-lane road up through the Franconia Notch just to my left. Copyright 2019 Jim Cluett

Cannon Mountain – Capturing Contacts Challenging

My good buddy and friend Jim Cluett, W1PID, and I made a return trip to Cannon Mountain yesterday. It was important for me to be there as I needed to minimize the distance between me and the ionosphere. When you do this, you’re above the fray and all of your signals have a better chance of being heard.

We once again set up on the Kinsman Ridge Trail just a three-minute walk from the tram building at the top of the summit. Riding the tram is free for old goats like us. It’s a benefit only available to New Hampshire citizens of distinction who have offered their protection to the state for a minimum of 65 years past their natal days.

Here’s Jim logging one of the many stations we heard, but they didn’t hear us. The first 90 minutes were frustrating, but the scenery soothed the pain. The top of Mt. Lafayette is just above Jim’s hat – the bare rock peak. Mt. Lincoln is the peak in the upper right corner of the photo. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

After we ate lunch, we set up the antenna. We started with my 44-foot twisted-wire dipole that had a 25-foot feed line. My extendable fiberglass panfish pole held the center of the antenna about 12 feet in the air. We had to lower it from its normal height for fear of breaking off the thin last two sections of the pole.

We heard quite a few stations with the first one being Kuwait, 9K2MU. His signal was so strong we were sure he’d answer us. It was not to be. Jim said he had worked him at least a half a dozen times before.

Here I am trying to snare a signal out of the air. This shot was taken after we kicked the 44-foot dipole antenna to the curb. That’s my Elecraft KX2 powered by a 3 Ah Bioenno LFP battery. Copyright 2019 Jim Cluett W1PID

Here’s a list of stations we heard but alas, they didn’t hear us. Note how all of them but one were over 3,000 miles away across the Atlantic Ocean:

• DK8IT
• N5DCC
• G3VBN
• G3VBS
• ON5UK
• PA1FP
• DF5KA

Switching Antennas

We tried for no less than 45 minutes to get someone to hear us. Jim thought the issue could be the feedline of the 44-foot dipole antenna. We had too much coiled up and close to the ground because we were unable to get the center of the dipole 25 feet up in the air. That’s a bad practice for sure. When you use low power, 5 or 10 watts as we do, to fling radio waves into the ether, you can’t afford to have any signal loss into the ground.

We decided to take down the dipole and put up my reliable 29-foot wire that we connect to a 9:1 unun. I store my antenna attached to the string I use as a halyard to hoist the wire up into tall trees. The string is coiled up on a dandy Trident finger reel used by scuba divers. I own two of them and have them with me all the time when we go out on these little-man self-discovery trips.

“Are you sure there’s an antenna wire on this spool?” Jim quizzed me as he was unfurling over 100 feet of green string onto the ground.

Not looking over at him I replied, “Yes, the antenna is on the spool. For goodness sakes can’t you see it?”

“I don’t see it.” Jim has a long history of yanking my chain to generate a rise out of me.

“Whatever!” I replied thinking how could he be such a dolt.

As Jim was working on switching out the antenna wires, I had spied a 10-foot tall dead tree log laying in the short evergreens near us. Once jammed into a crevice in the granite, it would create a fantastic secondary antenna support. It’s important to realize you want your antenna wire as high off the ground as possible.

Here’s the 29-foot wire antenna with an assist from the dead tree. You have to contort yourself to get comfortable after sitting on the hard-ass granite for an hour or more. Jim has a leg up on me as he has much better radio skills. Note the 17-foot yellow counterpoise wire deployed along the granite. It’s connected to a post on the 9:1 unun. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

Moments later I noticed he had grabbed the WRONG halyard reel out of my Pelican 1200 case that I store most of my gear. The CORRECT Trident finger reel that had the antenna wire at the end of the string was still in my backpack!

“You’ve got the wrong reel, you idiot! Didn’t you bother to look through the handy holes on the side of the reel to see all you had was string?” I chastised Jim.

“Maybe you need to put an antenna wire on the reel that’s a different color than the string!” Jim quipped.

“Whatever!” You can count on a snarky response from me from time to time. We both burst into belly laughs that I’m quite certain could be heard across the notch to anyone on top of Mt. Lafayette.

Jim’s no dummy. He’s a great operator and given enough time he can serve up a dish of revenge cold as the Wisconsin continental glacier that carved the valley you’re peering at 20,000 years ago. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

Target Practice

Mother Nature has been doing a great job over the past 13,000 years of turning the giant piece of bedrock that comprises Cannon Mountain into small pea-sized pieces of granite. The giant continental glacier that covered all of New England and most of the Midwestern USA all those years ago had retreated to just north of where we were sitting. Once the ice melted off the top of Cannon Mountain with no trucks, buses, factories around belching CO2, the hard granite was exposed to the elements.

The small pieces of granite are like ball bearings on the exposed ledge. You need to be damn careful not to slip and fall. Twice yesterday Jim almost tumbled because of a combination of the stones and wet rock from overnight heavy rainfall.

We switched off taking turns at the radio trying to avoid the skunk.

“Are you sure this thing is transmitting?” Jim asked.

“Yes, see the blinking red LED when you key up?”

“Well, that doesn’t mean much. You could have blown the finals.” Jim offered up his sage wisdom.

“Whatever!” That’s my standard reply when he mansplains things to me.

BOOM! Bulgaria!

Finally, Jim got a station to answer him! LZ50ZF. It was a fine DX contact from Bulgaria. The operator heard us perfectly giving us the best signal report you can get: 599

That proved my little Elecraft KX2 was doing just fine.

Jim surrendered the radio to me so I could also avoid the skunk. I think he decided to do some trail maintenance so others might not fall.

Here I am hard at work trying to avoid the skunk. The 29-foot wire was doing a superb job. Note how my hat resembles a round shooting target. Copyright 2019 Jim Cluett W1PID

I was bound and determined NOT to leave until I had at least one contact.

Soon I was tightly focused on spinning the VFO knob on the radio and all of a sudden I felt something hit my head.

It was a damn stone thrown by Jim! I chuckled and went back to work trying to get a contact. Then another stone hit my hat. And another.

“I’m starting to run out of small stones up here!” Jim announced.

Once again giant howls of our laughter filled the valley. We do have so much fun going out, it should be illegal. Surely we’re stealing the happiness from some others, but who knows?

Happy for Hungary

Moments later, I made contact with HA8QZ in Hungary. Oh, that was a great feeling!

Then both Jim and I made contact with Paul, a second Hungarian – HA8JV. We’d been at it for over two hours and it was after 3 PM. It was time to head back down the mountain.

Here’s Jim soaking up the scenery from the Cannon Mountain tram platform just before the tram arrived to take us back down. It was a splendid day. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

Here’s Jim strolling down memory lane. He’s standing next to the glider his daughter flew when she was just 14 years old. We were at the glider port at Franconia, NH. We decided to go there as we had time and it’s so close. It was just ten minutes up the road from Cannon Mountain. No one was there as the glider activity happens only on the weekends for the most part. Jim showed me all the planes his daughter flew. She was flying gliders solo before she could drive. What a fantastic feat. I’d love for her to take me up in one of those gliders. Who knows, maybe it will happen one day when she visits NH. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

A Fun Day

After leaving the glider port, we headed home. It was a fun and exhausting afternoon. I think laughing makes you tired and I know for a fact Jim’s going to have a sore right arm from flinging all those stones at me.

80 Meter NVIS Antenna – Don’t Get Hung Up on Theory

UPDATE: Since this article was originally published, I went to the pesky South Arm NEFR stage and did an official 80-meter NVIS test with four other seasoned operators. CLICK or TAP HERE to read about the successful test and listen to the actual audio recording of the test.

Watch the following video to see how to build and erect a basic 80-meter NVIS antenna. After watching the video, please read the field test stories below the video as this design flies in the face of a theoretical 80-meter NVIS antenna design.

I’m the Chief of Communications for the New England Forest Rally and we need to rely on NVIS to solve a tough comms problem. CLICK or TAP HERE to read about it.

CLICK or TAP HERE to download a simple plan and material list of this antenna.

CLICK or TAP HERE to purchase the banana post BNC connector to build the NVIS antenna in the video below.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Since the video was created, I’ve switched to wonderful fiberglass electric-fence posts instead of the cumbersome wood stakes you see in the video.

I rotated the image 90 degrees so it would fit on the page better. The left end has a point that drives easily into damp soil. The black fittings accept the NVIS wire with ease. You don’t have to feed the wire through them, just drop through the notch. CLICK or TAP HERE to order eight of them.

CLICK or TAP HERE to get the affordable fiberglass posts. You’ll need 8 of them. You may be able to get them locally at a Tractor Supply store – and for less money.

Field Testing Tales

I was first introduced to this simplistic antenna in 2014 when I first started to learn CW. My mentor Jim Cluett, W1PID told me about his discovery of this low-to-the-ground antenna because he used it to get onto the NH-VT traffic net each night from his home in Sanbornton, NH.

We have a very difficult communications issue on one of our stages in South Arm, Maine at the rally. CLICK or TAP HERE to read about this tough comms problem. This year, 2019, was my second year in the job and I decided to do an experiment with 80 NVIS with two other operators.

I set up this same antenna as you see in the video above, but it was even more wretched. It averaged just 18 inches above the ground. I was transmitting at 13 watts on my Elecraft KX3 and two other operators heard me crystal clear ten miles away. It’s very likely the success was due to a ground wave.

However, during the same test, my mentor 100 miles away was monitoring the test out of general interest and he heard me just fine. I had a conversation with him while I was waiting for my fellow operators in Maine to set up their 80-meter NVIS antennas just 10 miles away.

We were operating phone (SSB) because that’s how the comms would happen during the race. I’m doubtful my meager 13-watt signal would travel 100+ miles via ground wave over some semi-mountainous terrain, but I could be wrong. It absolutely might be why the other two operators were able to hear me and I hear them just ten miles away.

A week prior to the test at South Arm during July of 2019, I did a similar test with this antenna design in my backyard. That antenna was probably only 30 inches above the ground. I had successful SSB communications with my mentor who was 8 miles away and another old friend, Dave Benson, K1SWL, who was about 40 miles away. Once again, I was fairly low power, 10 watts, and I don’t believe that ground wave would make it 40 miles.

If you’re an antenna expert and can point me to a document that really shows how far an 80-meter ground wave can travel at different power levels, I’d be forever grateful. Please add those links in the comments below. 73 Tim Carter – W3ATB

Today was another grand summer day here in central New Hampshire. Jim Cluett, W1PID, and I went to one of our favorite hidden gems, the picnic tables next to the canoe and kayak launch ramp along the Pemigewasset River at Profile Falls. The locals call it the Pemi.

You can drive right up to the picnic tables from the main parking lot at Profile Falls, but Jim wanted to walk the quarter-mile from the parking lot to the picnic tables just above the bank of the Pemi. I arrived at the parking area about ten minutes before Jim and immediately became the smorgasbord for a swarm of junior mosquitos. They were the smallest I’d ever seen. Within seconds ten, or more, were feasting on my tasty neck, arm, and leg meat.

While waiting for Jim, I sprayed on my effective eucalyptus mosquito and tick repellent. I hate products containing DEET, and REPEL is the best product I’ve discovered so far.

Lunch Then Launch HF Signals

“I want to eat a picnic lunch along the Pemi. I’m sick of sitting on plastic chairs next to plastic tables or sitting at filthy tables outside restaurants with passing cars and trucks,” I informed Jim earlier in the morning when we hatched the Pemi plan.

Here’s part of my lunch. Shaved fresh turkey breast, tantalizing Raye’s Sweet and Spicy Mustard, cheddar cheese and romaine lettuce on whole wheat. Jim’s a vegan. My 21 oz Hydro Flask water bottle keeps my water ice cold. It’s super durable and fits well in a side pocket of my backpack. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

I also brought a small bag of fresh cashews that Jim and I split. He devours them and I do the same as they’re so tasty. For dessert, I brought some vegan chocolate coconut macaroons. They were so delicious I wished I had another bag. Jim and I split these as well.

Wire Antenna Works Well

“Listen. What kind of antenna do you want to put up?” Jim is always filled with questions.

“I brought my 44-foot twisted-pair dipole, but let’s just go with a vertical 29-foot wire.” I’m about simplicity on some days. Erecting a dipole is twice the work as you need to put up two halyards and the tree branches need to be far apart.

A vertical wire is perfect for this location because the giant evergreen tree at the picnic table allows the wire to hang straight down to the table. The first throw of my water bottle worked even though it bounced around the branches like a polished ball inside a pinball machine. Two strangers watched us and were stunned a person could get a string 40 feet up into a tree in seconds.

Here I am at one of the picnic tables. I’m concentrating on invisible electromagnetic waves that are being captured by the 29-foot wire hanging from the branches in the massive pine tree to my left. Copyright 2019 Jim Cluett W1PID

No Signals At First

As Jim put up the antenna using my halyard throw, I got out my Elecraft KX2 equipped with Elecraft iambic paddles. As usual, I power the radio with the lightweight Bioenno 12-volt 3Ah LFP battery.

The magic of HF outdoor radio and indoor radio for that matter is you don’t know what you’re going to discover once you power up. There could be scores of operators you hear or it can be as quiet as Badwater Basin in the middle of a winter’s night.

Once everything was connected I went to 20 meters and there were just one or two signals. I decided to let Jim use the radio first and his decades of experience paid off.

Here’s Jim focused and ready to add another QSO to the logbook. The strong breeze was keeping the midget mosquitos at bay. You can see the 9:1 unun in the black box on top of my backpack. This important component lowers the high impedance of the 29-foot wire. It’s all magic I tell ya’! My KX2 and all needed gear fit in that orange Pelican 1200 case. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

Soaking Up the Pemi’s Splendor

The Pemi cast a spell on me yesterday. I’ve been to this location quite a few times but only walked down the kayak and canoe launch ramp two other times. Today a siren song drew me once again to the bank as Jim was making contacts with the radio.

Yes, the Pemi is this beautiful. The water is crystal clear. Did you watch the video above? Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

A few years back Jim and I put in his aluminum canoe at this very spot. I was thinking about that adventure and was happy the mosquitos were not biting me as they were that day.

I’m happy as a clam in my new Chernobyl t-shirt. Granite is abundant in NH and no doubt there’s radiation, but I doubt I got 3.6 roentgen worth of exposure today! If you want great photos that show the true shape of your face, you need to use an 85mm lens, not the wide-angle BS lens smartphone cameras have! Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

Signals A Plenty!

Somehow ninety minutes had already passed by. How did that happen?

In the meantime, the 20-meter band had come alive. The logbook was starting to be awash in ink.

We worked Ric, KA3LOC in Kansas along with K9FW, Al in Indiana. But as sometimes happens, we heard stations but they could not hear our low-powered 10-watt signal. We usually operate with just 5 watts of power, but with solar conditions being what they are, we need as much power as the KX2 will muster so other stations hear us.

Here’s who we heard, but couldn’t make contact with:

• W6JL
• DL4NAC
• LZ1NK
• W26Y
• KX9DX
• LZ1MS

Lou on Long Island

Jim surrendered the radio to me and I worked Lou, N2JPR, on Long Island after hearing him call CQ. Little did I know it but Lou was recording our conversation and was kind enough to send it to me via email. The wonders of technology!

He said in his email, “Thanks for the nice QSO today! Conditions were good and you had a nice signal here to central Long Island. Thanks for answering my CQ call. Surprisingly, minimal QSB and QRN allowed solid copy. Your Pemi River hiking portable setup sounded good. Please find the MP3 recording attached of our QSO. You can hear your signal and what conditions were like on my side. Your fist was easy, armchair copy.  No need to reply QSL. According to my log, this was our first QSO.”

Bert Once More, Well Maybe

After signing off with Lou, Jim took over the radio again. It didn’t take long to find an old friend.

“Hey, that’s Bert!” I blurted out hearing his familiar call sign, F6HKA.

Jim and I routinely work Bert who’s six hours ahead of us in his house in France. Bert was in an extended conversation with another operator and we could only hear Bert’s Morse code.

“I wonder how long this is going to take?” Jim has many positive qualities and his unending patience is one.

Wanting to put another DX contact in the logbook I uttered, “Oh, not to worry. Bert would walk over hot coals to work us. He just needs to know we’re here.”

It was not to be. We called Bert after he ended his conversation with the mystery operator, but he didn’t hear us.

Time To Go

After failing to contact Bert, we decided it was time to go. We had been there almost two and one-half hours but it seemed more like thirty minutes to me.

In just nine weeks all the trees along the Pemi will be ablaze with color. Reds, oranges, yellows, crimson all offset by the evergreens. The color so brilliant you think it’s fake.

How lucky I am to live where Mother Nature has some of her best work on display. Come visit. You can hold the sign Jim and I display for strangers to keep them safe that says:

! DANGER !

High-Frequency Radio Radiation

Loitering May Be Dangerous to Your Health

Keep Moving

Do NOT Stare at Equipment or Antenna

For those inquisitive and doubtful visitors that ask why we’re not affected by the radio waves, we always answer that we’re wearing lead underwear. I carry a small piece of sheet lead in my Pelican case to show them. Seriously.

You’re looking at the infamous Franconia Notch as Jim and I ride up the tram to the top of Cannon Mountain. Out west they call these passes. I-93 passes right by Echo Lake and then starts to go downhill towards the Great North Woods in the upper left of the photo. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

“Tell me everything.”

That’s what I heard when I answered the phone yesterday morning. It was my pal and good friend Jim Cluett, W1PID. He wanted to know how we could take advantage of a stunning summer day here in central NH. The forecast was for 80 F and sunny skies.

We both know from experience that in just a few short months we’ll be longing for a warm sunny day as the November cold rains turn into dreadful December snow and ice.

“I don’t know about you, but I’m going to ride the tram up to the top of Cannon Mountain to work some European radio stations,” I spoke through my new Motorola G7 smartphone.

This tiny panoramic photo doesn’t do justice as what your eyes see when looking out across from Cannon Mountain to the majestic Lafayette Mountain on the other side of Franconia Notch. I KNEW we’d have a giant dish of eye candy waiting for us once we exited the tram. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

“What time are we leaving?” Jim blurted out after a momentary pause. His brain was whirring away at the possibilities the adventure might produce. Cannon Mountain is one of the top destinations because of the spectacular views and elevation achieved so easily by the 8-minute tram ride to the top.

He was so surprised by my suggestion he would have left right then if we could have.

This is but one reason Jim was excited to leave to get to Cannon Mountain. This is the view you get of Mt. Lafayette just across from where you sit on the granite ledge. You feel as if you can reach out and touch it. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

What’s So Special About Cannon Mountain?

Cannon Mountain is a spectacular feature in the White Mountains of New Hampshire. The Old Man of the Mountain used to be on its eastern face, but he crashed to the granite talus in the valley below on May 3, 2003.

The tram to the top of Cannon Mountain is part of the magic. Just about every other peak in the White Mountains you have to invest lots of effort to get to the top. The tram delivers you to the top of Cannon Mountain in about eight minutes from the parking lot!

This is the tram car arriving at the lower base platform. It’s about to cough out passengers from the top like a bad hairball. My biggest suggestion is for the park employees to wash the windows of the tram each night. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

The Kinsman Ridge Trail

Once you arrive at the top of Cannon, you exit the tram building and walk down to the start of the loop trail. You just walk 150 feet, maybe 200, and you intersect where the Kinsman Ridge Trail comes up 1.7 miles from the bottom of the mountain.

Jim and I turned left to go down the Kinsman Ridge Trail for just another 150 feet. There we arrived at a narrow band of solid andesite granite ledge. Here we met two young women who had spent three hours getting from the bottom of the mountain to the top.

This is the last small section of the Kinsman Ridge Trail just below the summit of Cannon Mountain. These two young ladies were coming up from below just as Jim and I arrived. They had left the trailhead below three hours before but were so fit they looked like they had only been hiking ten minutes. Jim’s hair and shorts telegraph to you how breezy it was up there. I’d estimate a sustained 20 mph wind was blowing from the south. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

Lunch and The Antenna

It was 1 pm when we arrived at the vista point. Both of us were hungry, but I had brought no food. There’s a restaurant in the giant tram station at the top of Cannon, but Jim had offered me half of his vegan sandwich carefully prepared and wrapped in wax paper by his thoughtful wife.

I had never had a vegan sandwich and was terrified there could be wretched green peppers in it. I hate green peppers more than I hate sandworms, especially the ones on Venus.

Jim assured me there were no green peppers and I used my favorite Sog Flash II pocketknife to divide the sandwich in two using the plastic Tupperware® top as a cutting board. The sandwich was delicious, and I wished there were three more.

I’m in the sunglasses. Jim has the baseball cap on. You can see how serious amateur radio can be when DX QRP contacts are on the line! Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

It’s important to realize that radio communications can be quite serious business. After all, an operator might travel a great distance, set up his equipment in less than ideal conditions only to discover the solar activity has rendered the atmosphere into a slothful sack of ions that have no interest in bouncing our radio signals to other parts of the world.

One thing I’ve discovered in the years of going on radio adventures with Jim is that each contact we make with another operator, especially ones thousands of miles away in Europe, is to be savored like the finest gourmet ice cream or candy one might get at Aglamesis Bro’s in Cincinnati, OH.

If you hear a station when they are few and far between on the bands, you want to capture them at any cost because you might not hear anyone else. It’s the same when given the opportunity to taste delicious candy. Fortunately, in the case of great candy, you can get it anytime you want. Aglamesis Bro’s will ship their delicious delights to all points in the USA. Oh what I would have given for a dark chocolate pecande yesterday, but I digress.

After eating, we immediately set up our antenna. We used Jim’s featherlight expanding fiberglass cane pole to hold up a 29-foot thin wire. It was in the shape of an inverted V. One end was tied around a small juniper branch and the other end I tied off to a loop at the top of Jim’s backpack using his explicit directions.

It might be hard to see the two thin wires, but they’re there. Being up 4,100 feet above sea level sure helps get our signal out and also allows us to better capture other radio transmissions. Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

The antenna wires were flapping in the wind, but they never came loose. Jim connected the one end of the wire to his 9:1 unun and a short coax cable went from it to his Elecraft KX3. The radio was powered by a small Bioenno 3Ah lithium-iron-phosphate (LFP) battery.

Did You Hear Lots of Stations?

Jim turned on his radio and started out on 20 meters. Twenty meters is the go-to band for long-distance contacts. It was as quiet as a graveyard at three in the morning. Radio operators often lament this condition as the bands being dead.

Here’s Jim trying to find other stations on the HF bands. When the weather is this nice, you don’t want to waste these days target shooting, that’s for sure! Copyright 2019 Tim Carter W3ATB

“Tim, there’s not one signal on 40 meters!”

“Well, did you try 30 meters?” I asked.

“Nothing. There’s nothing on 30 meters.”

“How about 17 meters?” I inquired.

“I checked already. Nothing there either.”

It was looking like a repeat of three days earlier when Jim and I had traveled south to Salem, Massachusetts to help out a special event station. We spent 90 minutes on the air that morning and got skunked. I was in a foul mood driving home that day!

Here I am working Bert in France. I had to tilt back my wide-brimmed Duluth Trading hat and drop my sunglasses so Jim could see my eyes. Why was I complaining about lack of food? Hells bells, I’ve got enough under the lower part of my t-shirt to last two weeks or more. Maybe three! Copyright 2019 Jim Cluett W1PID

Bert to the Rescue

Moments later Jim got back on 20 meters and there was our dear friend Bert, F6HKA doing Morse code with another operator. Bert lives in France. What a delight to do DX from Cannon with a tiny radio and low power!

Jim and Bert have conversed countless times and he’s such a gentleman, Bert that is. Jim’s a great guy too, but always keep in mind his priorities when doing outdoor radio!

We both got to work Bert and we were relieved that we avoided the skunk. It’s always fun to send your callsign to Bert and he comes back with, “FB Tim”. FB means fine business in CW or Morse code.

Just as we equate immediately Bert’s callsign to his name, he does with us. This comradery is part of the attraction to the ham radio hobby. Keep in mind many of us have never met face-to-face.

Just after working Bert a husband and wife, we think, came up the trail from below. They were tired but astonished we were able to do ham radio from a mountain.

Germany!

When you set a low-powered radio in front of my dear friend Jim and do it in a stunning outdoor setting on a day where the sky is so blue it hurts your eyes to look at it, be prepared for an almost zen-like experience. Jim convinced me years ago that outdoor radio is magic and I don’t dispute it for a second.

“You know, I think we possibly take it for granted that we can just come out here to an outcrop, set up our radios, and make contact with others across the Atlantic Ocean. When strangers see us do this no doubt they’re very very curious,” I mused.

Seconds later a strong signal was heard! It was a special event station in Germany of all places, DM19BUGA. It was celebrating a national garden exhibition in Heilbronn, Germany. The operator was sending Morse quite fast, most certainly above 20 words per minute.

Here’s the special event QSL card you might get in the mail if you made contact with DM19BUGA. It’s gorgeous and Jim loves flowers. Copyright 2019 DM19BUGA

You can’t allow an operator like this to escape and he had a minor pileup happening. A pileup is when multiple stations answer another station’s signal at the same time. Stronger stations almost always overpower low-powered stations like us. Remember, we were transmitting at a power level, around 5 watts, that you might use to make a night light glow!

Seconds later a dad and his son came up the trail. The dad was most interested in our setup and I started to answer his questions as Jim focused all his energy on trying to make contact with the German operator.

With the wind blowing, and the real possibility that the German station’s signal could disappear into the ether, the intensity level grew faster than a speeding bullet. We HAD to make contact with the German station, but at the same time, I was trying to be polite to the hikers.

Looking back, I should have probably had a simple laminated sign that read, “Ham Radio – Harmful RF Waves – Move Along RAPIDLY for your Safety”. Nah, that’s too scary.

I think I’m going to have some small business cards printed up that say:

INTENSE Radio Comms in Progress

Please go to https://w3atb.com/qrp for details about what you see, especially a video about how the antenna was put far up in the air.

CLICK or TAP HERE to see all of the photos from our adventure yesterday.