On September 20, 2021, I had a full day planned in town. It was one of those days where my few errands and appointments were spread out across the day in such a way that driving back home between appointments made no sense. I knew I might have a bit of time to kill.

The big appointment holding me in town was recall service work on my Subaru that would take most of the day. The dealership reserved a loaner car for me.

That morning, I cleaned out my car (removing a couple of radios and antennas) and I packed a backpack with the supplies I’d need for the day; water, sandwich, laptop, and (fortunately) my Elecraft KX2 and AX1 antenna.

I would take this pack with me in the loaner car as I ran my other errands.  I remember thinking that there was  likely no possibility of doing an activation–it was rainy and I knew even getting set up at the service center might take an hour. I packed the Elecraft gear nonetheless. (Never leave home without a radio, I say!)

That morning, I drove to the Subaru dealership and–long story short–the service work had to be cancelled. While I wasn’t happy that I’d made the early morning trip to the dealership for nothing, this did essentially free up a good portion of my morning to play radio. Even though I had my own car for the day, I had completely emptied it of radio gear, so the KX2 and AX1 were truly all I had. Continue reading Elecraft KX2 and AX1: Seriously…how effectively can such a compact field kit work? →