Many thanks to Thomas (DM1TBE) for the following field report:

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Shivering with 18 WPM on the ruins of the medieval Hohenstaufen Castle

by Thomas (DM1TBE)

Intro

It had been two weeks since my last field activation and my bad conscience grew, so a friend and I scheduled an activation, even with expected temperatures at -2 °C / 28 °F. The choice fell on the summit Hohenstaufen (DM/BW-102).

The Hohenstaufen is one of the two SOTA summits that I can see from home in Southern Germany and one of the so-called group Drei Kaiserberge – the middle one does not qualify for SOTA, unfortunately.

A Little Bit of History

On top of the summit are still ruins from the medieval Hohenstaufen Castle. The castle was built around 1050 and used until 1525, when it was looted and burned down during the German Peasants’ War. The summit has been populated since at least the 8^th century.

The castle (picture from 1470 above), was the seat of the Hohenstaufen dynasty to whom belonged several Kings and three Emperors of the Holy Roman Empire, which, at its greatest extent, included the area of Germany, Switzerland and parts of France, Austria, Italy, Czech, Belgium, Netherlands, Slovakia – or easier: almost all of Central Europe.

The history of the House of Hohenstaufen was misused by Nazi-Germany when they named the 9th SS Panzer Division Hohenstaufen.

There is not much left of the castle nowadays, but you can still spot parts of the foundations and walls.

Equipment

Due to the positive experiences during the last two activations, I decided to go with an end-fed half-wave antenna for the 30 meter band along with my Elecraft KX3, a 4Ah LiFePo4 battery, a 10 m / 33 ft fibreglass pole and the BaMaKeY TP-III (a 70 g / 2.5 oz light magnetic paddle). The paddle is too light for me to use, so I usually attach the magnetic base of the paddle to a metallic clamp on a clipboard. Although I studied computer science, I prefer pen and paper for logging. Part of the fun is the guessing of the logged call signs after an activation.

Activation

The summit is within walking distance from home, but the weather and a tight family schedule coerced me to drive the 15 minutes to our starting point.

Jochen (DG1PSI)–a friend from our local ham radio club–and I met at the foot of the summit next to an over 500 years old church. The weather was, as expected, difficult with snow falling and freezing temperatures.

It takes just app. 900 metres / 0.6 miles from our meeting point to the summit, but the incline of 160 metres / 550 feet during this short distance made me wheeze like a steam engine.

The compacted gravel made the actual trail easy to walk to the peak plateau.

Once we reached the summit, we enjoyed the scenic views. The picture below is towards Stuttgart, which is roughly 40 km / 25 mi. away. The Stuttgart region has many Mercedes and Porsche car factories, and a large US military installation with the United States European Command (EUCOM). It is also known for Pretzel and Spätzle.

It started to lightly snow, but we wanted to operate anyway.

Jochen used his Icom IC-705 and a PAC-12 antenna. The PAC-12 became very popular recently here, as the China clone of the Buddistick has some advantages over the original.

It works with ground radials, rather than one elevated radial, the extension coil can be adjusted much easier for the appropriate band and the replicability of settings for specific frequencies is way better. I have both and only use the PAC-12 antenna, also known as JPC-7, any more.

As said, I was working with a KX3 and end-fed half-wave for 30 meters.

After spotting me on 30 m, the fun begun. During the operation in CW, my fingers became slightly blue, and I had to stop after around 20 minutes.

Jochen took over and activated the summit in SSB while I was trying to defrost with the help of hot tea.

At the end, I had 16 CW QSOs and one SSB sked in my log.

After around 60 minutes, we headed back to our cars with a hot drink and our warm houses in mind.

Hopefully, the spring starts soon and allow us longer, more enjoyable activations.