[UK-CONTEST] 1st 160m test - G3LET

[Peter Hobbs]

I suspect a fair proportion of the usual suspects were otherwise engaged 
last night, with only 34% of UK QSOs.  Propagation was quite 
disappointing and the noise level here was much higher than usual.  
Having only the main transmitting wire to receive on, I felt really 
stupid at times - towards the end there were several NA I just couldn't 
resolve.  Deep and rapid fading affected most DX signals, with the 
exception of NP4A! 

Highlights were J38XX, who didn't let on where he was listening and 
occupied a fair part of the band (but was actually easy to work) and 
JA5DQH who I copied one letter at a time in the narrow JA time window.  
Quite a bit of time was wasted early on looking for stuff to the east, 
leaving me a long way behind the leaders after the first hour.  Cue for 
frantic sweep up the band for PAs, which helped a bit and a few 
difficult NA in the last hour to finish off.

Total 202Qs, 24C, 49D = a rather disappointing total of 971.  It would 
have been one more if DK3UZ hadn't sent "QRU" and carried on calling CQ 
RSGB - something to do with wanting a QSL I suspect (which I no longer 
do) . . .

Thanks to all for the QSOs.

73, Peter G3LET