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Dear readers, admittedly the title is clickbait, but I assure you that there is truth behind it. As you already know, I occasionally travel for work and lately I’ve been working inside a correctional institution for my primary employer.

And, as you’ve seen before, while traveling usually I make a detour to go activate a site in the area or along the route, and to get a break from the drive. Usually that detour is only 10 or 20 kilometres. I enjoy the driving and the travel, and I’m always on the hunt for parks I’ve not yet activated and especially the elusive ATNO -All Time New One- or phrased another way, not yet activated at all or with one of the common modes of Phone, Digital or CW.

For this series of trips over the month of November, they were the first real road trips with my new-to-me 2023 F-150 PowerBoost hybrid. In the month leading up to this trip I was a busy beaver getting the radios installed in the truck to help pass the many hours on the road. Frankly I was excited to set up a new mobile installation and correct some major shortcomings with my last; experience is an excellent teacher if you are willing to listen.

With all of that background and with an unseasonably warm November, I wanted to visit Waterton Lakes National Park which hosts several POTA entities, namely First Oil Well in Canada NHS CA-4776, Prince of Wales Hotel NHS CA-6101, Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park CA-3157, and all of those (and many others) are encompassed within the Waterton Biosphere Reserve CA-0109.

Waterton-Glacier is a Unesco World Heritage site and the second such I’d visit in this series of road trips. On a prior week I twice activated Head Smashed-in Buffalo Jump CA-6093.

Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park encompasses both the Waterton National Park in Alberta, Canada and Glacier National Park in Montana, USA. It’s the first international designation of a park anywhere, ever. You’ve seen me write about Glacier National Park here on QRPer last year, and now I’d get a chance to complete that entity activating within the Canadian side. Needless to say I was pretty excited about the detour and hopeful that weather would be on my side for some spectacular photos.

Unlike Head Smashed-In, this trip wasn’t that close to the route between home and the hotel. Some careful planning was required so that I would get to my final destination by an appointed time and have enough time to activate all the entities I hoped to tackle that day. One stop would be a repeat visit, and 4 others I’ve never activated before. I’d get shut out of one of them for lack of vehicular access and I hadn’t planned on a hike-in activation. I’ll get to it next year perhaps.

Departing home just after first light and about a half hour before sunrise, I was treated to a lovely pink-coloured cotton candy sky but heavily cloudy. By the time I was within photography range of the Rockies the pink had passed. But I’d see other vistas later in the day to compensate for that missed opportunity.

The view never gets old. I aimed my truck south on Highway 22, The Cowboy Trail, and set the cruise control and enjoyed the view.

Two and a half hours later, I was entering Waterton National Park. The area reminded me of the Yaha Tinda area of Central Alberta, which is a wide valley that takes you directly into the heart of the Alberta Rockies’ back-country.

Despite my planning and research, I had a bit of difficulty figuring out how to get to the First Oil Well site. While the Prince of Wales hotel can be spotted from miles away and is super-easy to get to, there’s no signage that tells you where to turn off for the First Oil Well. After a quick visit to the park’s visitor centre where I showed them my 8×10″ printed park map, I was set off in the right direction along with an 11×17″ map that was much easier to read, despite my picking one written in French. I’m glad I paid attention in high school French classes! Up the road I went towards a road that would put me very close to the Akamina-Kishinena Provincial Park CA-0691 were I equipped to hike in and over the border to British Columbia. That park is still an ATNO at the time I wrote this article. On this road I was within a few miles of not only the border to the USA but also a neighbouring province.

About 8 kilometres up the Akamina Parkway road I located the site. I set up on 15m and finished up the activation from the warm comfort of my vehicle.

Given my close proximity to the mountains literally surrounding me from all sides, I wasn’t surprised that received signals were heavily attenuated. Where I was giving out 519 reports, I was receiving 579s so I knew at least people could hear me. The RBN would show I was heard in the southern hemisphere as well.

Back down the hill to the Prince of Wales Hotel NHS site which is on a high bluff on Waterton Lake. The history of this hotel is fascinating as the spot is perpetually windy which presented unique challenges when it was under construction. Indeed, as I parked beside the hotel (closed for the season but land access was open), my truck was rocking back and forth a fair bit in the gusty weather. You can see the whitecaps in one of the photos on this page to get an idea. After leaving this activation and just 8 kilometres down the road, the wind was nearly non-existent.

On this day I also stopped at a few other POTA entities, namely Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints National Historic Site CA-6122, Police Outpost Provincial Park CA-0666, and Outpost Wetlands Natural Area CA-3098. While I was able to activate at two of these, the Outpost Wetlands is pedestrian access only and in bear/cougar country so I passed on attempting it. Both of the Outpost sites sit at 49 degrees north -the border between Canada and the USA- and thus having excellent maps and GPS to ensure you don’t make an unplanned entry into the USA is a must.

List of gear used for these activations:

• Yaesu FT-857D
• Yaesu ATAS-120A antenna with lengthened whip
• Breedlove stake pocket antenna mount for the ATAS
• American Morse Products DCP
• Ram Cup Holder mount for key

Summary

Traveling to new places means to be flexible as Brian, K3ES, noted in his excellent article about his 6 week road trip. Keep your options open and don’t be afraid to cut your losses and move on when faced with an obstacle, like no road access at a site. Enjoy the trip. Take photos.

Then, when you are done, write about it so others can live vicariously through your experiences!

73 and dit dit,
…Vince

First introduced to the magic of radio by a family member in 1969, Vince has been active in the hobby since 2002. He is an Accredited examiner in Canada and the USA, operates on almost all of the modes, and is continually working on making his CW proficiency suck less. He participates in public service events around Western Canada and is active on the air while glamping, mobile, at home or doing a POTA activation. You can hear him on the Ham Radio Workbench podcast, follow him on Twitter @VE6LK, check out his YouTube channel, and view the projects and articles on his website.