ACØPR, ham radio blog: Slow Day at Quail Creek State Park, UT POTA/WWFF CW QRP

Operating position

Another POTA/WWFF activation, K-3086, on a Monday morning since I have the week off work. This one is less than 1/2 hour from home and has been activated for WWFF, but not for POTA. I wanted to go when there wouldn't be many people, but I was worried about how many contacts I would get on a Monday morning.

At the park:

I arrived about 7:30am or so, hardly anyone there at all, which is what I was looking for. I had previously scouted out a spot--right by the parking lot, a picnic table and a tree with no much else around so there wouldn't be a lot of people close by to trip on wires or be bothered by the equipment. I set up fairly quickly, took a couple of pictures and got ready to get started.

The park is basically the lake and the shore, not much else, so there's aren't tons of options. The area sits kind of low so I was afraid my signal wouldn't get out too far. That early there weren't many boaters so there wasn't much noise.

On the radio:

I moved back to the KX2 (and will most likely continue with it for POTA/WWFF). I had everything in a small day pack except for the mast and tripod to hold it. Since I was 10ft. from the pickup, I used those. I had the pole right next to me and with how high it is, I didn't take up very much space.

I started on 40 meters this time. I don't get many on that band, so I thought I would do that and get it out of the way and spend the majority of my time on 20 meters. I got a couple of initial ones, which surprisingly were in KS and WI--it was early enough that I could get farther.

Then I changed to 20m. It was slow going and the reports were low--meaning my signal wasn't very strong. I guess DX isn't going to happen this time. I did get into the east coast though (NH, NJ, RI) so obviously some signal was getting out. However, I didn't make a lot of contacts and it took nearly an hour to activate it for POTA..

At the very end I went looking for a park-to-park contact I got KE1AK, Corry in Rhode Island at Burlingame Stake Park. It wasn't an easy contact, but we got it. After that I packed up and explored the park a bit more. No video made this time.

Call	Date / Time	Bnd	Frequency	Mode	Name	ST	MYP	P2P	Rec	Snt
N0RZ	8/10/2020 13:50	40	7.047	CW	CHARLES	KS	K-3086		559	599
W9AV	8/10/2020 13:52	40	7.047	CW	Julien	WI	K-3086		459	579
N4MJ	8/10/2020 14:06	20	14.057	CW	GLENN	TN	K-3086		579	579
KD1CT	8/10/2020 14:18	20	14.057	CW	ROBERT	NH	K-3086		559	599
WK2S	8/10/2020 14:28	20	14.057	CW	Art	NJ	K-3086		539	579
VE3LDT	8/10/2020 14:29	20	14.057	CW	David Wg	ON	K-3086		449	579
KE4I	8/10/2020 14:37	20	14.057	CW	DENNIS	GA	K-3086		339	579
KG8P	8/10/2020 14:40	20	14.057	CW	Thomas	MI	K-3086		339	599
AB4WL	8/10/2020 14:41	20	14.057	CW	JAMES	AL	K-3086		339	599
KI7O	8/10/2020 14:44	20	14.057	CW	WILLIAM	OR	K-3086		559	599
W9AV	8/10/2020 14:52	20	14.057	CW	Julien	WI	K-3086		459	599
N4NN	8/10/2020 14:57	20	14.057	CW	ALLEN	GA	K-3086		229	599
K8RAT	8/10/2020 15:08	20	14.057	CW	WILLIAM	OH	K-3086		579	579
KE1AK	8/10/2020 15:26	20	14.059	CW	CORRY	RI	K-3086	K-2871	449	559