Category Archives: Field Reports

Field Report: Dave ventures into the fog to play FT8 POTA!

Many thanks to Dave (K1SWL) who shares the following field report:


October 6th POTA activation

by Dave (K1SWL)

I’m pretty much a died-in-the-wool CW guy. I’m not averse to dabbling in other modes, though. Friday, October 6, 2023, was such an occasion. I’d noted that there’d been little recent Digital activity in one of our area’s Parks. As if it needs more familiarity, it looms over I-91 only three miles from the Connecticut river. As a result, it’s been activated more than 75 times.

This was Mount Ascutney State Park in VT, and at 3144′, features a paved road to the summit. Off I went!

Finding a parking space at the summit lot wasn’t an issue. The top of the mountain was socked in above 2500 feet. Visibility was 30 to 50 feet, and sightseers were inexplicably scarce.

I normally use a 20M end-fed antenna and homebrew pneumatic launcher. The stunted trees at that elevation made that less practical. I used instead Hustler resonators for 10M and 20M atop the truck cab on a mag mount. I usually consider that setup a compromise, but at 2000 feet above average terrain (HAAT), it didn’t matter.

The operating position inside the truck is quite comfortable. A melamine-clad slab serves as the operating surface. (see above) The chain at the far end was a design ‘iteration’. I’d originally just supported that end on the passenger-side arm rest. I’d operated from the driver’s side, and one day got out, went around and absent-mindedly opened the passenger door. The whole station headed for the ground. I caught the rig but the Vibroplex Iambic paddles were a loss. A fabulous excuse for a Begali- and a hard protective case! When I’m operating from the truck, an IC-706MKIIg and 15-AH Bioenno battery does the honors. If gear needs to be carried any distance, the KX3 makes more sense. The station itself takes two minutes at most to set up.

So how’d it work out? A closeup of the WSJT-X screen (seee above) illustrates it. (The device is an MS Surface.) I was getting as many as 3 replies to my CQs at a time. I wound up ‘interleaving’ three contacts at a time. It got confusing! I need to look into ‘Fox/Hounds’ operation to speed things up for the future.

All in all- a great success. A total of 62 FT8 contacts in a little over 2 hours. 16 of these were on 10M at the start and the balance on 20M. The attached QSO Map (att. 4) shows the contact distribution- mainly eastern US with a few Europeans for good measure. Will I do it again? You bet!

73- K1SWL

Amazing POTA Fun: Pairing the Elecraft KX1 and AX1…but first, a little lunch!

I was speaking with my buddy Joshua (N5FY) in mid September. He’d recently acquired an Elecraft KX1 and the topic came up about pairing the KX1 with the AX1 antenna. I realized that in all of my experimenting with the AX1, I’d never paired those two. What!?!

Time to fix that!

On Thursday, September 28, 2023, I had a nice midday window to play radio. After dropping my daughters off at their classes, I stopped by the French Broad Food Co-op and grabbed a container of their chicken noodle soup from the refrigerator section.

I then made my way up the Blue Ridge Parkway (K-3378) to the Craggy Gardens Picnic Area at Bearpin Gap–one of my favorite spots on the BRP.

Despite stunning weather and the beginnings of fall foliage, the parking lot was pretty empty. After all, it was a Thursday and a good week or two before leaf-lookers descend upon western North Carolina.

I pretty much had the picnic area to myself (there was one other person there). I picked a picnic table at the top of the hill under the trees.

Mahlzeit!

When my wife and I lived and worked in Munich, the salutation I learned before any other was “Mahlzeit!” At Siemens, I remember walking through the hallways and people I’d never met before exclaimed “Mahlzeit!” as I passed by.

I quickly learned that Mahlzeit essentially meant “Lunch Time!” and I still say it today to my family when I’m about to make or grab some lunch. Funny how these things stick with you.

Now where was I–? Oh yes…

First thing I did at Craggy was set up my stove to start heating the soup. I show this in my activation video below.

If interested, here are the components of my stove kit:

Quick continuity check!

Next, it dawned on me that I would need to attach the AX1 counterpoise to the KX1. I didn’t bring one of my copper clamps to attach to the outside of the AX1’s BNC connector, so I needed to find another grounding point on the KX1.

I then remembered that the KX1 has two thumb screws on the bottom of the radio. Knowing Elecraft, I assumed that these screws could be used as an attachment point for a counterpoise, but I wanted to confirm that the screw itself had a direct connection to ground.

Fortunately, I keep a small multimeter in my supplemental gear bag in my car. It’s an inexpensive Allosun Pocket Multimeter. I use it for things like this: testing.

I set the multimeter to read continuity and then placed one probe on the outside of the KX1’s female BNC and the other on one of the thumb screws. Sure enough, there was a direct connection to ground. I didn’t need to worry about the KX1 chassis paint insulating the connection to ground because the thumb screw had a direct connection. Perfect! Continue reading Amazing POTA Fun: Pairing the Elecraft KX1 and AX1…but first, a little lunch!

The prettiest activation ever – Spray Valley Provincial Park

As always there are lots of links within the article. Click one! Click them all! Learn all the things! ?

Ahhh .. few things in life compare to the view one sees while lakeside in the mountains. The flat water is a stark contrast to the towering mountains nearby. There is at least a 4000′ difference in height between the two at my destination in this story. For me, nothing so succinctly tells me where I fit in the world as when I stand among these giants.

So It was with that big goal in mind that a drive through the mountains of Alberta’s Kananaskis Country region was called for. The drive would take me through sweeping vistas, over high mountain road passes, along nearly 100km of gravel roads in no-cell-service backcountry while racking up nearly 400km of travel in one day.

Along the way I activated two never-before done parks in the POTA system and scouted out one more to be done at a future date. This is the story of the lakeside activation… but first, watch the short video to understand why I’m gushing on the beauty of this particular spot and written this atypical (for me) article about the activation itself.

The Drive to the activation

Overview of the trip. Darker lines indicate gravel roads. First activation is along the westernmost gravel road along the lakeshore.

For those of you that want to replicate this trip, here’s the route I took shown on the map above.

From just before when I turned north off Highway 541 to Highway 40, and until I reached Canmore, there is zero cell service. Same again turning onto Highway 68 from 40 until Bragg Creek.

Alberta has much backcountry that is well beyond cellular range. Working at The Candy Store(tm) as I do, I have access to items like the Zoleo Satellite Communicator to give me text messaging and SOS capabilities should I need them. Before I discovered SOTAmat, I used the Zoleo for all of my spotting in backcountry.

Continue reading The prettiest activation ever – Spray Valley Provincial Park

Testing the Ionosphere: A 100 milliwatt to 1 watt POTA Activation During a CME? Why not!?

Sometimes, I like the odd “exercise in futility.”

I enjoy shaking up routine and since POTA and SOTA activations are my routine, they end up being the shakers.

On Monday, September 18, 2023, I found out that our planet was rotating into a large CME (Coronal Mass Ejection). This CME made all of the space weather news and we planned for either some potential radio blackouts or at least very unstable conditions.

As I’ve said many times before, I never let the potential for poor propagation stop me from hitting the field. Don’t let it stop you either.

Lake Norman State Park (K-2740)

I had a full afternoon to play radio, so I made my way to Lake Norman State Park.

En route, I tried to think of a way to shake up the activation a bit. I planned to activate at the same spot I had during my last visit because I knew the park’s main trail system was still closed and, frankly, I wanted to take advantage of the EV charger at the visitor’s center again!

I’d packed MW0SAW’s End-Fed Half-Wave (the gift that keeps on giving, Steve) and I did have one new radio toy (more on that later).

I also had a lot of time–at least, more than I normally do during a POTA activation–so I thought it might be fun taking my KX2 down to the lowest power setting it has: 100 milliwatts.

I’ve activated parks with 100mw before, but never intentionally on a day when I knew propagation would be poor.

I figured with enough time, maybe I would get the ten contacts needed for a valid POTA activation.

If not, it would be fun trying!

Why Milliwatting?

At the end of the day, I think taking our radios and antennas to their low-power extremes gives us a taste of what we can actually do with so little signal.

I remember shortly after I bought my first Elecraft KX1 in 2008, I was speaking with a local ham and he told me that a maximum output of three watts was pretty useless and that I really needed a minimum of five watts if I expected to make any contacts.

Part of me did feel like perhaps I’d bought something more akin to a toy–fun to look at and hold, but not terribly practical.

Then I started using that KX1 to make contacts and even carry on extended rag chews. Turns out, three watts gets a lot done!

Today, I’ll often run my MTR-3B with three watts or even less when activating a summit and the results are simply outstanding–fabulous DX and contacts galore.

I know 100mw is a proper compromise, but I like knowing what I can achieve with so little. Tinkering with it in the field and listening to signal reports (also reading RBN stats) gives me a good idea.

In an emergency situation? If I could only push 100mw into a decent antenna, I know it wouldn’t be ideal, but I know it wouldn’t be futile either.

Begali Adventure Dual

Another activation motivation was the opportunity to test my new-to-me Begali Adventure Dual paddles. Continue reading Testing the Ionosphere: A 100 milliwatt to 1 watt POTA Activation During a CME? Why not!?

Guest Post: The Full Moon, Eels, and /P Operation on Mount Peyton, NL, Canada

VO1DR on top of Mount Peyton

Guest Post: The Full Moon, Eels, and /P Operation on Mount Peyton, NL, Canada

by Scott (VO1DR)

Introduction

I have been eyeing Mount Peyton in central Newfoundland for years as an attractive spot for /P HF operation.  Even before my radio adventure to Mount Sylvester (reported earlier in QRPer.com), I have been seeking a way to get up Mount Peyton.  Like Mount Sylvester, Mount Peyton is an inselberg of granite protruding above the glacial plain of central Newfoundland.  However, Mount Peyton is even larger and higher; an elongated ridge about 800 m long reaching up to 487 m (1,599 ft) above sea level.  For SOTA enthusiasts, it is designated VO1-CE-005, multiplier 4.

Figures 1 and 2 show the location local topography around Mount Peyton.

Figure 1 – Highway map of central Newfoundland showing Mount Peyton and landmarks
Figure 2 – 1:50,000 scale map I used during trip showing topography near Mount Peyton and our hiking route.  Each block is 1 km on a side.

Mount Peyton is a case of “so near and yet so far”.  Just west of Gander, this ridge is visible in the distance south of the Trans-Canada Highway (the main arterial highway traversing the island of Newfoundland).  However, in summer there is no trail directly to the top, and access to its base is only via rough ATV tracks and wet bogs.  One must get to the base of the mountain, then hike overland to the south side and climb a long inclined cleft in the hillside to the top.  This cleft is the surface trace of a fault in the underlying granite (see route on Figure 2).  By contrast in winter, Mount Peyton is a popular and readily accessible snowmobile destination with dozens of machines roaring up this same cleft on a thick blanket of snow.

The Full Moon and Eels

Looking at maps and Google Earth, an approach on foot would entail a three-day hiking trip.  While this sounds delightful, my current living situation would not permit this, and in addition I have no hiking buddies able and willing to make such a commitment.  So, it became clear I needed all-terrain vehicles (ATVs) to get quickly to the base, so we could do the entire trip in one long day.

I don’t own an ATV and after multiple attempts over this summer to find any ATVers interested in such an adventure, there were no takers.  Apparently ATVers like to ride, but don’t like to get off their machines ?. I finally found a local outfitter (Paul) who not only could supply ATVs, but had hiked multiple times to the top of Mount Peyton – a perfect fit.  For safety, I needed at least one extra person to go to the top.  All other potential radio or hiking companions fell by the wayside for various reasons, so it became just me and Paul.

As is common in rural Newfoundland, Paul is a Jack of all trades and is also a commercial eel fisherman.  American Eels (Anguilla rostrata) have a fascinating life history (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_eel) and inhabit freshwater rivers and streams in Newfoundland.  Paul harvests them in conical net traps anchored to the stream bottom (Figure 3).

Figure 3 – An eel trap in place in a local stream.  Eels move into the large mouth and get trapped in the bottom cage.

He told me that eels run during the new moon and stay put near the full moon.  Now doesn’t that ring deep bass notes of evolutionary biology!?  Since eel fishing is an important part of Paul’s income, we agreed to fit in my radio around his eel-catching.  He would be available around the full moon when the eels were sluggish; toward the end of September, the moon was full on the 29th.  Given the local weather, we settled on Tuesday, September 26 as our day.  Isn’t life fascinating – the moon controls eel movement, which controls human movement, which controls our /P radio expedition!

Getting There was Half the Fun

I drove from St. John’s to Paul’s cabin west of Glenwood, NL on the afternoon of Sep 25, on the beautiful shores of Indian Arm Pond (Figures 4 and 5).

Figure 4 – Paul’s cabin on Indian Arm Pond
Figure 5 – Shoreline of Indian Arm Pond

We planned an early departure on the ATVs.  Sun-up was around 7 am and sun-down was about 7 pm, so we had 12 hrs of daylight to work with.  September 26 dawned bright and clear (Figure 6) and we were soon packed and underway on two ATVs (Figure 7).  We drove for over 2 hrs on a wide range of roads, tracks, and rough trails to a point where we dropped the ATVs and started hiking (one way distance 26.7 km or 16.6 mi).

Figure 6 – Dawn over Indian Arm Pond on September 26.  Time to get moving!
Figure 7 – Scott on Polaris 450 ATV ready to go.  Black lumbar pack on right.  Blue survival bag on left.  Pole strapped on my left.  Radio and spare water in elbow compartments.
Figure 8 – Turtles are huge in Newfoundland
Figure 9 – Passing over beautiful Neyles Brook.  This is quintessential central Newfoundland scenery.
Figure 10 – Magnificent Mount Peyton looms in the distance.  This view is toward the nearly-vertical NW face.  We are about half-way there.  After dropping the ATVs, we will hike around the right end and climb up the far (SE) side.

This trip reinforced that I am not a motor sports guy.  The ATV ride was long, bone-jarring, and noisy.  Buying an ATV at great expense and doing this for “fun” is a mystery to me; and forget about seeing any wildlife.  But, hey, the ATVs got us there; we couldn’t have done this trip without them! Continue reading Guest Post: The Full Moon, Eels, and /P Operation on Mount Peyton, NL, Canada

A Recap of the 2023 W4 SOTA Fall Campout

Another W4 SOTA Fall Campout is in the books! What amazing fun.

This year, the campout was held at Lake Rabun Beach Recreation Area in north Georgia.

Once again, Joshua (N5FY), and I shared a campsite. He arrived Wednesday afternoon and I showed up Thursday afternoon around 2:30 PM.

There was quite a lot of wet weather in the forecast, so I opted to bring my large 6 person tent (the orange one above) instead of my two person ultralight tent. My thinking was that, if need be, we could us the large vestibule on this tent as shelter while eating and cooking.

Joshua was way ahead of me, though, and brought a canopy for the picnic table.

After pitching my tent and setting up, Joshua and I discussed how we should spend the rest of the afternoon. One thought was to try to squeeze in a SOTA activation, but we would have been fighting sunset at the end of it.

Instead, Joshua suggested that we build some antennas.

It was then I noticed that Joshua’s picnic table canopy had a built-in spool of 26 gauge wire!

I shouldn’t have been surprised. Joshua is the fellow behind the Tufteln brand of antennas. Turns out, he brought along a full antenna-building station.

I built a long random wire antenna and started a 30M EFHW.

That evening, we had friends pop by the campsite, ate dinner and fit in a quick POTA activation.

We didn’t have to drive to the activation site because our campground was in the Chattahoochee-Oconee National Forest (K-4473). Continue reading A Recap of the 2023 W4 SOTA Fall Campout

A Trailside, Low-Impact, Knee Board POTA activation at the Carl Sandburg National Historic Site!

On Friday, September 15, 2023, my wife and I had a few hours midday to enjoy the gorgeous pre-fall weather, so we decided to go on a hike with Hazel.

My wife was the one that suggested I pick out a hike that would open the door to a short POTA activation (isn’t she the best–?).

Carl Sandburg National Historic Site (K-0804)

Earlier that week, I made a note to activate the Carl Sandburg National Historic Site in the village of Flat Rock, North Carolina. I passed this idea by my wife and she agreed that it’d make for a perfect outing.

The mission of the Carl Sandburg National Historic Site is to preserve Connemara, the home of Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and writer Carl Sandburg.

The park has a wonderful trail network and I hadn’t visited it since 2016, during the National Parks On The Air (NPOTA) ARRL event.

Technically, I could go back into my NPOTA logs and upload my Sandburg activations to the POTA site because previous activations do count, but I’m not actually motivated by my park count so much as I am just having fun working new-to-me sites under the new POTA program.

That said, my somewhat flexible, non-committal goal of having at least 100 unique parks activated for POTA before the end of 2023 was also on my mind; a small motivator to expand my POTA footprint.

Admittedly, there really aren’t many parks that are within two hours of my QTH that I haven’t already activated for POTA. The ones left, like Sandburg, are just outside the corridors I normally travel.

The Sandburg site is a beautiful one, and I think Hazel may have even remembered this spot from so many years ago. My wife and I got a kick out of how giddy she was to hit the trails, smell the smells, and meet all of the other hikers.

Hazel: “Enough talking, Dad! More hiking!”

Time to hit the trails and find an activation spot!

Knee Board Portable!

Back in 2016, I got permission from a Sandburg park ranger to place a wire in a tree in order to perform my NPOTA activation. She only asked that I perform my activation on the trail network (not at the house and goat farm).

Wow…I just checked and I had forgotten that I made a short field report of that activation over on (my other blog) the SWLing Postcheck it out here.  Back then, my KX2 was still very new and shiny!

Not even a scratch on the KX2 back then! Today, Hedy looks a little more field battered! 🙂

And here we are seven years later and I’m still activating the Carl Sandburg site from my lap. This time, however, I don’t have my radio on a clip board, I’m using a folding knee board:

This is my Tufteln/N0RNM folding knee board and you’ve seen me use it in numerous activation videos.

Instead of just placing my logs and radio on the knee board, like I did back in 2016, I wanted to place my entire antenna system on it, too.

You see, although I’m sure the staff at the Sandburg home wouldn’t mind me putting a wire in their trees along the hiking trail, I couldn’t find a staff member to ask, so I used this as an excuse to try something I’ve always wanted to do: mount my AX1 on the knee board as well!

We found a park bench a mile up the trail and decided to set up there. Continue reading A Trailside, Low-Impact, Knee Board POTA activation at the Carl Sandburg National Historic Site!

Getting To Know You Series: The Elecraft KX3–My thoughts, notes, and one extreme QRPp contact!

I’m very fortunate in that in the past few years I’ve accumulated a number of QRP radios that I use in rotation when I do park and summit activations.

I’m often asked for advice on choosing radios, and as I’ve mentioned in the past, I feel like the decision is a very personal one–everything is based on an operator’s own particular preferences.

Over the years, I’ve written formal reviews about most of the field radios in my collection. In those reviews, I try to take a wide angle view of a radio–to see how it might appeal to a number of types of operators. I highlight the pros and cons, but I don’t focus on my own particular take because, again, my style of operating might not match that of readers. I try to present the full picture as clearly as I can and let the reader decide.

The Getting To Know You series gives me an opportunity to highlight one radio at a time and showcase what I love about it and why it’s a part of my permanent radio collection. After we spend a bit of time talking about the radio, we’ll do a park or summit activation with it!

The Elecraft KX3

I was originally introduced to the Elecraft KX3 at the 2011 Dayton Hamvention–over a decade ago at time of posting!

I was commissioned to write a review of the KX3 for the Monitoring Times Magazine and Elecraft was kind enough to lend me a brand new KX3.

At the time, there was nothing like the KX3 on the market and I felt like I’d just received a radio from the future.

The KX3 offered 160-6 meter general coverage with an optional 2 meter module, ATU, internal AA battery compartment, and roofing filters. The controls were top mounted and current draw in receive was as little as 150 mA. At the time, there was no other radio on the market that could compare with the KX3’s field prowess.

But it wasn’t just its field design that was impressive.

In fact, when Rob Sherwood tested the KX3, it placed at the top of his list which is sorted by Third-Order Dynamic Range Narrow Spaced.

This field radio sported a bullet-proof front end and true contest chops, displacing $10,000+ high-end rigs.

Today, the KX3 (at time of posting) is still number 12 on Rob’s list. An impressive feat!

Herein lies the danger of doing reviews…

I didn’t have the KX3 in my grubby little hands for more than a few hours when I decided I had to buy one. I sold some gear to free up money and I bought the KX3 Elecraft sent me on loan for the full price.

I’ve taken this KX3 on numerous activations and on international travels. It’s a brilliant QRP companion.

These days, it’s in the shack more than in the field because I keep it hooked up to my KXPA100 amplifier. I feel like the KX3/KXPA100 combo is like having a poor man’s K3. As a huge bonus, the KX3 takes up little space on my table and the KXPA100 sits on a shelf–the overall footprint is much smaller than a K3 or K3s. It’s like having a remote head on my desk and works perfectly for my limited space shack.

The KX3 is a stellar, benchmark field radio, so it was great fun to feature it in this video.

Zebulon B. Vance Birthplace (K-6856)

For this Getting To Know You report and video, I decided to activate one of my favorite local parks on September 12, 2023: the Vance Birthplace. Continue reading Getting To Know You Series: The Elecraft KX3–My thoughts, notes, and one extreme QRPp contact!

Matt’s “Crackadawn POTA” Field Report

Many thanks to Matt (W6CSN) who shares the following post  from his blog at W6CSN.Blog:


Crackadawn POTA

by Matt (W6CSN)

This is the weekend in October that features the U.S. Navy’s Blue Angels taking to the skies over the Bay Area. The air show takes place over the Bay waters, which means the beaches and shorelines around San Francisco will be packed with people and traffic. Since my usual POTA operating location is right by East Beach, I had pretty much given up on the idea of activating K-7889 this weekend.

Lights of the Golden Gate Bridge reflecting off the still Bay waters.

The airshow is on Saturday and Sunday, but the Blue Angles practice on Thursday and Friday, weather permitting. So here I was on Friday morning, awake at 5AM watching K4SWL on YouTube doing POTA when the idea of getting out for an early activation got into my head.

It was still dark when I tossed my backpack, which was already loaded for POTA from the previous activation, into the car and headed down to the East Beach in the Presidio of San Francisco National Historic Site (K-7889).

The sky getting lighter in the East before sunrise.

Given the early hour and low light conditions I didn’t relish the idea of doing my usual picnic table and tripod antenna setup. Not long ago I had acquired one of those “mirror” antenna mounts with the jaw clamp arrangement, and this was a great opportunity to try it out. Between the parking lot and the beachfront promenade there is low fence constructed of short steel posts and strands of stainless cable. The fence post was a perfect place to attach the clamp and the MFJ-1979 17 foot telescopic whip, which is a quarter wave on 14 MHz.

Close up of the MFJ-1979 whip antenna clamped to steel fencing.

I was ready to string some radials out to give the antenna a ground plane to work against, but wondered if the post, being sunk into the ground by the Bay and the steel fencing cables might provide enough of a counterpoise. A quick check of the SWR on the meter built into the MTR-4B showed a 1.2 to 1 – no need to even bother with radials with an SWR like that right out of the box.

Low SWR on the quarter wave vertical as the Bay wakes up.

The other advantage of this antenna setup was that it is right next to the car. However, I don’t really like operating from my vehicle as it’s not very sporting nor is it comfortable. Instead, I simply set the station on the trunk lid and completed the activation from a standing position. The other advantage of this arrangement was that I could closely guard the RG-316 coax going from the radio to the antenna to keep any humans or canines from getting entangled. Continue reading Matt’s “Crackadawn POTA” Field Report

POTA at Lake Norman: Beautiful day for a TR-45L trailside activation (and hunting VE6LK)!

I’m getting used to having an electric vehicle for my weekly travels including POTA and SOTA excursions.

My Volvo C40 has a published range of about 226 miles on a 90% charge, but I find that I actually get more than that. I almost never need to recharge from a public charger–I just plug it in at home.

At least once a week, I visit my parents in Hickory, NC and that round trip (including errand running in town) logs a good +/- 200 miles. By the time I return to the QTH, I typically have a comfortable 20% charge left on the battery.

Many of the parks I activate in that travel corridor are 20-30 minute detours off of Interstate 40 (for example: Lake James SP, South Mountains SP, Tuttle Educational SF). They have no negative impact on my ability to make it back to the QTH with battery capacity to spare.

Parks, however, that are still close to Hickory, but in the opposite direction of home, may necessitate a quick charge at one of the many public charging stations along the road. Not a big deal, but it’s kind of fun when I can do a full trip on one charge.

Flag at half staff in memory of September 11, 2021

On Monday, September 11, 2023, I had a full afternoon open and really wanted to fit in a proper hike. One of my favorite easy six mile loop trails–the Lakeshore Trail– is at Lake Norman State Park.

Lake Norman, however, is in the opposite direction of the QTH and is about an 80 minute round trip. I fit in errands along the way, but going there means I’ll need a bit of a charge to get back home the following day.

After a little research, though, I discovered that Lake Norman (much like Lake James) has free EV charging at their visitor’s center! Woo hoo!

Lake Norman State Park (K-2740)

I arrived at the park in the early afternoon and–whew!–both of the EV charging stations were free. In fact, the visitors’ center parking lot was almost empty–I would have expected a few more cars. I found that curious.

I plugged in my car, put on my hiking boots, grabbed my hiking sticks, then made my way to the spur trail that connects the visitors’ center parking lot to the Lakeshore loop.

Only, when I reached the trailhead, there was a notice stating that all of the trails were temporarily closed. Wait…what?

This may explain the lack of visitors.

I was bummed to say the least. My backup plan would be to hike the road at Lake Norman, but that’s not nearly as fun as a proper trail.

I then walked to the visitors’ center and asked the staff inside about the trail closures. They pointed out that there was one small loop trail–next to the visitors’ center–that was still open.

I was pleased to hear that and decided that instead of hiking one long loop, I could simply hike the same small loop several times.

I thanked them then gave them a donation (which I was going to do anyway) especially since I was getting free EV charge!

I walked out the side entrance of the building and onto the Alder Trail.It was a very nice little loop trail and long enough that I didn’t feel like I was walking in circles. Continue reading POTA at Lake Norman: Beautiful day for a TR-45L trailside activation (and hunting VE6LK)!