Many thanks to Jeff (VE7EFF) who shares the following guest post:

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Off The Beaten Path – Campbell-Brown Ecological Reserve, CA-3925

by Jeff (VE7EFF)

This is the 2nd backpacked-in POTA activation outing that my wife and I have done this summer.  I’m the 2nd person to have ever activated the Campbell-Brown Ecological Reserve (CA-3925).  Last year was the first time I activated this eco reserve and that was also my first ever backpacked-in POTA activation.

After studying my GPS and Google Maps/Satellite view of the area, my goal this time is to trek about twice as far and twice as high as last year’s outing.  There are no documented trails here.  Access is a mixture of old overgrown and abandoned forestry road (or fire break, not sure which) and some crisscrossing animal game trails.  The actual mileage/Km’s isn’t really that far, but it’s all uphill and a mixture of bushwhacking and scaling slippery grassy slopes.

The reserve borders along the busy highway 97, between the cities of Vernon and Kelowna, BC.  The area overlooks the beautiful Kalamalka Lake, as you will see in some of the photos.  There’s no actual parking lot, just a small gravel pull-over spot just off the highway.  There is no formal pathway into the reserve either, so we had to scale the gated fence to start our journey.

I’m a little bit familiar with the route we took last year, but I heavily rely on my Garmin 66sr GPS and Google Maps/Satellite view on my Pixel phone.

My wife Alexis (VE7LXE), accompanies me on all my POTA outings.  She packs the food and water while I pack the ham gear and other outdoor essentials.  We both carry IC-V80 VHF handhelds for comms in the event we ever get separated.  And of course we always carry bear spray when doing backcountry treks.

We do have some relatively flat areas in sections, but there are also a lot of deadfall trees to either step over, climb over, or go around.

This grassy meadow is where I activated last year.  Actually at the top end of the meadow.  But today’s goal is to find another open grassy meadow higher up the mountain.  Higher usually means better radio propagation, not to mention spectacular views.

Beyond the grassy meadow, we followed some semblance of a trail.  But it wasn’t long before I realized that it wasn’t taking me where I really needed to go. So, according to my GPS and Google Satellite, we needed to head straight up-hill.

This was actually a real slog uphill (especially for us 73 and 72 year olds). 🙂

We decided that we have gone high enough.  Time to off-load our packs.

It looks like we have intersected with an old cut-trail which offers a foot or two of semi-level ground on which to operate and set our stools and chair.

I can see the meadow far below where I activated last year.

What a spectacular view of the Kalamalka Lake!

I think we are high enough where I can get some decent low-angle propagation today.

Time to unpack my shack-in-the-pack.

While Alexis organizes the Helinox furniture, where we will be hanging out for the next 4.5 hours, I’ll be working on erecting the antenna system.

The top Elecraft bag carries all my backpackable antennas and accessories.

The bottom bag houses the Elecraft KX2 with internal battery and ATU, paddles, and spare battery.

I also carry a light-weight telescopic mast, which I haven’t used yet.  It’s for when I don’t have a viable tree to hang my antennas from.  With trees, I can usually get the antenna up much higher than a 20’ mast can.

My antenna today is an experimental homebrew ½ wave “Vertical Coaxial-Sleeve Dipole”, cut for 20m band.  This is the 1st time I’m deploying this antenna in the field.  I built it yesterday specifically for backpack ops.

Typically, I activate with my 20m or 30m center fed dipole, built and sold by N9SAB (excellent portable dipoles).  Dipoles take more time and work to deploy the center feed as well as guying the dipole end wires.  I typically would deploy as a flat dipole or inverted-V.

On the other hand, coaxial sleeve dipoles are typically oriented vertically for omnidirectional propagation.  Today, I’m deploying it as a slightly slanted vertical, perhaps at a 15 or 20 degree angle off vertical center and oriented such that I hopefully maximize propagation to the SE direction, which gives me good coverage of the SE USA from the pacific NW.

While the dipole is physically end-fed, electrically it functions as center-fed dipole, due to the magic of RF skin effect over the first half of the dipole.  I used RG-174 as the medium for the coaxial sleeve dipole. The coax is electrically cut for  ~ ½ wavelength on the 20m band.  The bottom end of the dipole is terminated by a Fair Rite #43 1.4” toroidal core.  This core blocks any RF from traveling back below the toroid towards the transmitter and sets the overall length of the ½ wave dipole above the toroid.  At the apparent center of the RG-174 coax antenna, ¼ wave above the toroid, I separate the shields.  I soldered the upper shield to the coax center conductor to enhance the upper radiator conductor surface area.

The bottom half of the RG-174 coax acts as both a 50-ohm transmission line and as the lower half of a dipole (this results from RF skin effect on the shield outer surface).  For further details, you can Google the topic of coaxial sleeve dipoles.  At the end of the day, we’ll see how it performed…

Using my 8 Oz Weaver throw bag, I was able to deploy the antenna about 30 ft above the ground in this Douglas Fir tree. (Of course the ground is at a ~40 degree angle here, so height is kind of relative to where I’m standing.)

The blue coaxial cable is the equivalent of RG-316 50 ohm coax. It’s called EnviroFlex 316, available through Digikey.

A closer view of the toroidal choke that terminates the bottom of the 20m ½ wave antenna.  I tested this antenna with my antenna analyzer at home and the choke perfectly isolates the antenna portion of the coax from the input side.  While this does look like an end-fed antenna (and physically, it is), it’s electrically functioning as a vertical dipole (theoretically anyway).  With the KX2 ATU, this antenna tunes up on all bands between 30m-10m with a low SWR.

I typically carry two Helinox Speed Stools, one to sit on and one for the KX2 and log.  It’s a bit low to the ground, but it beats sitting on the ground.  The reclining Helinox comfort chair is for Alexis, where she sits and reads or sketches while I make lots of CW noise.

I’m all set and ready to log some CW contacts.

This is where I’l be sitting the better part of the next 4.5 hours.

I’ll be transmitting at 8 Watts power level. (Considered QRO by some standards 🙂 .

As always, I start on 20m CW until I log at least 10 contacts, then I move on to the upper HF bands.

First contact was at 16:45 UTC (09:45 PST), with K0BXB in WI.  Over the next 30 minutes I made a total of 12 contacts on 20m to WI, CA, UT, NV, FL MA, MI, ON, MB, and CO.

Next, I move on to 17m.  Seven more contacts here to VA, TX, SD, and NC.

AND, as a bonus I bagged IK4IDF in Italy and EA1AF in Spain !

Moving on to 15m, I make seven more contacts, including IL, TX, IN, MO, WI, and KS.

Time to try my luck on 12m.  I got one from Texas.

Anything on 10m?  Yes; just one for Florida.

Back to 12m.  Yes, one more in Illinois.

Is 15m still up?  Yes, six more on 15m for ON, CA, MI, OK, OH, and AZ.

One last crack at 17m before we have to pack up.  Yes, five more on 17m including OK, NY, MA, GA, and PA.

My last contact was at  21:14 UTC (14:14 PST) with WB3AVD in Pennsylvania.

A couple hours earlier, we did get rained-on for a few minutes, but then it blew over.

In total, I logged 40 POTA CW contacts across 5 bands, 20m-10m, including coast-to-coast and even trans-Atlantic to Spain and Italy.  Not bad for 8W and an unknown experimental vertically oriented homebrew coaxial sleeve dipole.  It does help to be in a period of solar maximum!

I think this antenna may be a keeper.  But, I do have plans to build a 17m version, for the times I can’t get the antenna up as high or maintain a near-vertical orientation. They may even work just fine as an inverted-L too.  One day I may try that.

Time to pack-up and head back down into the unknown abyss.  Alexis doesn’t want to go back the way we came, because it is very steep and could be too difficult for her (us).

We are thinking that this bit of an overgrown old cut trail that I operated from may be a gentler path down, so we decide to give it a try and see where it goes.

It seemed just fine for a while, until we realize it’s going too far in the opposite direction that we need to be going (thank goodness for GPS to actually know where we are).  Then we find another trail that turns out to be a dead-end game trail.  Next, we try different options that take us in the right direction we need to be going, only to find out this takes us again too far in the other direction away from where we need to be to get back on the right track.

In the end, we have no alternative but to do some bushwhacking to get back to known territory.

It’s easy to get lost in the back country where there are no well-established or marked trails.  Having GPS and Google Maps with satellite view is really a necessity when doing these kinds of treks.  And, of course, we make lots of noise so that the bears are aware of our presence.  This helps avoid any chance encounters.  We do have bear spray on the ready, just in case.

In the end, we made it back to the car without any major incidents – just a little more walking and bushwhacking than intended.

Until next time, 73 from Jeff and Alexis in Kelowna, BC, Canada.

My Equipment List

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• Elecraft KX2
• Elecraft Internal KXAT2 Automatic Antenna Tuner
• Elecraft KXPD2 Paddle
• Homebrew ½ wave “Vertical Coaxial-Sleeve Dipole”
• Weaver 8 oz throw bag
• GM CLIMBING Throw Line 1.7mm, 180 Ft Roll High Strength Arborist Outdoor Utility Cord
• West Coast Paracord Plastic Ladder Winder Cord Storage Organizers (Blue, 20 Pack)
• PARACORD PLANET 95 Type Paracord, Variety of Colors, 100 ft
• 5.11 Rush 72 Tactical backpack, military grade
• Helinox Speed Stools
• Garmin 66sr GPS
• Counter Assault Bear Spray, purchased via Margo Supplies, Canada or USA.
• Bear Spray Hip Holster, Margo Supplies, Canada or USA