Everybody must have been contesting this weekend, only 11 messages in 2
days!
I personally had a GREAT time this year. I operated K1NU which took
place at the QTH of K1TTT. Couldn't be there Friday evening, or
Saturday until evening, but had a great time when I got there. I'm not
much of a 160 fan, mainly becuase of a lack of experience. Well, 160
had me hooked for the better part of the night. Got 3 hours sleep
between 0200z and 0500z, and then got up to work the European greyline.
That was a first for me, to hear the band litteraly switch on, and then
fifteen minutes later switch off. It's really amazing, but those 15
minutes are sure a blast!
I had planned to sleep more after the 160 greyline, but decided to check
some spots on 40. Worked there for a while, but then started to see
some 15M spots along about 0900z, so I was off to 15 to check. The 20M
op was having a fun time getting the European stations to turn their
beams and stop working each other, but amazingly I was able to work
Europe on 15M. At this point sleep is history. Within a half hour I
had established a pretty stable run, and that run continued on and off
throughout the day, regardless of the operator.
Well, this was breaktime. But before I had a chance to think about
sleep, 10M started to open. from 1700z until I left at 2000z I didn't
have a period where I was below 20q's per hour on 10, and most of the
time I was higher than that for rate. 10 opened to Africa, Southern
Europe (even squeaked GW4BLE out just as 10 peaked to the east). Then
the band started to turn. NH7A is spotted. Tune in, descent signal. I
call...worked one call. Work or zone 3 10M mult as I find a run
frequency. Then, I just set one antenna on Europe, one on South
America, and one West. Had 4 ZL's call me. Worked VK4 with good
signals. 10 sounded like what I'm used to on 20! It looked like the
propigation might continue, and maybe the east coast would be able to
work some Asia on 10M. Unfortunatly, other duties called and I had to
hit the road home.
This is my first experience with 10M being open like this, and I LOVE
it! I was first liscenced in September of 1993, and was not on HF until
the spring of '94, so I don't know what sunspots over 100 must be like,
but I can't wait. What a thrill to have 3 bands running at the same
time in a M/M! Looking foward to the next contest!
In Love with Sunspots (and big antennas high in the sky),
Al, KE1FO
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Al, KE1FO, ex. KE6BER mailto:ke1fo@contesting.com or ke6ber@tiac.net
Check out my web page, http://www.tiac.net/users/ke6ber for summaries
from the contest reflector and a growing list of amateur radio links.
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