Lately, it’s been a proper challenge to get out and activate.

I’ve had a number of projects that have kept me at home working and when I do head out the door, my timing has been tight. While I love squeezing in park activations when I’m otherwise busy running around town, I also never activate if it’s truly inconvenient.

I’m a big believer in never feeling pressure to activate. Rather, I believe in enjoying the radio journey and therapy.

This is why I don’t pay close attention to my stats in either the POTA (Parks On The Air) or SOTA (Summits On The Air) programs. Maybe when I’m an empty-nester in a few years I’ll spend some time working on my numbers–for the fun of it–but for now, it’s just not in the cards. (Admittedly, when I have more free time, it’ll be fun to achieve my first Mountain Goat award!)

On Monday, April 15, 2024, I planned a trip to my hometown of Hickory, North Carolina, to take my father out to lunch at the airport café.

If you’ve been a subscriber/reader for long, you’ll know that for the past five years, I’ve spent a lot of time in Hickory doing caregiving for my mother. I would typically spend a night or two in Hickory per week and take her to her frequent oncologist and specialist appointments. .

When she passed away in January, and my sister and her daughter moved in with my father, I no longer had a need to do weekly overnight trips. Indeed–I have no place to stay as the house is full. It’s all worked out really well and now our family trips to Hickory are mostly day trips with my wife, daughters, and Hazel.

It was during those overnight trips that I would fit in park activations–there are a number of parks around Hickory that I would frequent.

Thwarted Rove

I’d plotted a proper POTA rove en route to Hickory on the 15th. I planned to hit a number of parks I used to activate frequently–at least two parks on the way and one or two parks during my return home.

I packed my car with three different radios and a variety of antennas with the idea of using a different pairing at each park.

Twenty minutes into my journey to the first park that morning, I received a call from my daughter’s physician who reminded me that she had an appointment at 2:00 in the afternoon. Doh!

Somehow, that appointment didn’t make it into the family calendar and it was too late to shift it to another date.

I’ll admit: I was bummed.

This dramatically changed my schedule, but I was determined to fit in at least one activation and lunch with my father. As I was driving, I did the mental time math–if I activated Lake James, it would be a very modest detour and I would have an hour or so to play radio. I’d need to pick up my father no later than 10:45 to take him to a (now early) lunch.

This would give me just enough time to get back to the QTH and pick up my daughter no later than 1:30 PM.

I called my father and confirmed it all.

Lake James State Park (US-2739)

I arrived at the Lake James entrance around 8:45 AM. The weather was beautiful and ideal for POTA.

I knew I had about one hour to fit in this activation and I wanted it to be relaxed since the rest of the day would be pretty pressed, time-wise.When I first arrived at the Lake James parking area, I thought I was going to be the only visitor on the site. After hopping out of the car, though, I heard a group of people shouting and then noticed a load of cars and a school bus at the opposite end of the lot.

Turns out, at least two school groups were visiting on a field trip.

I made my way to the lakeshore and picked out a picnic site in the shade and with a nice antenna support (i.e. tree) just waiting to assist in my activation!

I decided to pair my Elecraft KX2 with an end-fed half-wave my buddy Steve (MW0SAW) built for me a couple years ago.

As I started setting up the antenna, a school group, led by one of the park rangers, moved to a site nearby to do some hands-on science. Part of me hoped they might venture past my site and I was ready to tell them all about amateur radio, if asked, but they remained at the same site during my entire activation.

Gear:

Note: All Amazon, CW Morse, ABR, Chelegance, eBay, and Radioddity links are affiliate links that support QRPer.com at no cost to you.

• Elecraft KX2 with Windcamp X2 Side Rails
• Tufteln Magnetic Protective Cover
• KXPD2 Paddles
• Elecraft KXBT2 Li-Ion Battery Pack
• LowePro CS60 Hard Side Case
• High Visibility Jacket ABR240-UF with PL-259s and 5 Ferrites (Use Coupon Code ABR10QRPER for 10% Discount!)
• MW0SAW end-fed half-wave
• GoRuck GR1 USA
• Weaver arborist throw line/weight and storage bag
• KOH-I-NOOR Mechanical Pencil
• ‎Rite In The Rain Top Spiral Notebook
• HEROCLIP Carabiner Clip (attached to my backpack)
• Camera: DJI OSMO 4 action camera with Sensyne Phone Tripod
• DJI Wireless Microphones

On The Air

Again, since I had a fair amount of time to complete this activation, I thought I’d experiment by heading to the higher bands, knowing they’d have less activity.

I started calling CQ POTA on the 10 meter band which turned out to be completely dead. After a few minutes of calling CQ, I moved down to the 15 meter band.

On 15 meters, I worked three stations in six minutes. Not too bad, especially at this time of the morning!

Next, I moved down to 17 meters where I logged an additional five stations in a mere three minutes! Wow! Then 17 meters fell silent.

I knew 20 meters would likely be active and it was time to speed up the activation so that I could grab the ten needed to validate the park and be on my way.

On 20 meters, I worked an additional five contacts in four minutes including a Park-to-Park with K2JVB (thanks!).

When I called QRT (reluctantly) I left an active pileup behind.

QSO Map

Here’s what this five-watt activation looked like when plotted out on a QSO Map:

Activation Video

Here’s my real-time, real-life video of the entire activation.  As with all of my videos, I don’t edit out any parts of the on-air activation time. In addition, I have monetization turned off on YouTube, although that doesn’t stop them from inserting ads before and after my videos.

Note that Patreon supporters can watch and even download this video 100% ad-free through Vimeo on my Patreon page:

Click here to view on YouTube.

Morning POTA is Amazing

While I was disappointed I was missing out on a nice POTA rove (haven’t done one of those in ages) I was pleased the one activation I performed was so pleasant and relaxing.

Plus, this now gives me an excuse to plan yet another POTA rove!

I had a great lunch with dad afterwards, and made my way back up the mountain to pick up my daughter on time.

In the end, it all worked!

Soon, we’ll be in our summer schedule and I should have much more time to activate parks and, especially, summits!

How about you? Do you find you have more time to activate during the summer? Or in other seasons? Let me know in the comments section.

Thank you

Thank you for joining me during this short lakeside activation!

I hope you enjoyed the field report and my activation video as much as I enjoyed creating them!

Of course, I’d also like to send a special thanks to those of you who have been supporting the site and channel through Patreon, and the Coffee Fund. While not a requirement, as my content will always be free, I really appreciate the support.

As I mentioned before, the Patreon platform connected to Vimeo makes it possible for me to share videos that are not only 100% ad-free but also downloadable for offline viewing. The Vimeo account also serves as a third backup for my video files.
Thanks for spending part of your day with me!

Cheers & 72,
Thomas (K4SWL)