Topband: Stew Perry Contest

[EP Swynar]

On 31st December Tom wrote...

> I think conditions last night would have tried even the legendary patience
of the man from Winthrop! I just about managed 5 NA stations from 2200 -
2300z and 3 more from 0400 - 0415z. All NA signals were way down. Did make
it with JH4UYB at 2159 though.

****************************
Hi Tom,

Well, this was my first-ever attempt at the Stew Perry Contest --- it was a
lot of fun, & certainly a challenge copying all of those different grid
squares correctly through varying conditions...!

Here in southern Ontario I found the band to be quite good toward Europe in
the evening...managed to work G0IVZ & GI0KOW from your side, plus three
other Europeans. The QRM here, however, was quite fierce by times from
stations that were not hearing Europe, so some of the contacts were
tough-sledding indeed.

I went back on the band at about 0500Z to find a noticeable increase in QRN,
compared to the evening before.

Propagation was good enough to have allowed me 275 QSOs in just under 6
hours of operating --- not too bad for a first-time effort from a pencil
pusher/paper hanger such as yours truly, I think! The level of participation
was VERY high on this side, & it was a real pleasure to work old & new
friends alike in the fray...

I hope everyone else had a good time, too...!

Now to take a stab at some post-contest computerized logging!

~73~ Eddy VE3CUI - VE3XZ