Sunday, August 12, 2012

Castle number three: Heemstede II

Acceptable conditions on 17m and 20m on a nice location

Last week I had the opportunity to visit another castle before heading home. This time it was a castle just south of Utrecht. It is know as "Heemstede II" with the WCA and COTA-NL reference PA-00742. It was built in 1645 to replace a medieval castle in its vicinity (Heemstede), that has since disappeared. This is what the castle looks like today:

Heemstede II - PA-00742

And this is what it looked like in 1698:
Heemstede II in 1698
I found an operating spot next to the canal that runs from the river Rhine up to Amsterdam and passes the castle. I was hoping that little bit of water would help my antenna (even if the effect is only psychological). The view was very pleasant anyways and the weather was good with sun and moderate temperatures (22C).

PH0NO/P
Radio conditions weren't too good. The higher bands were quiet so I started on 17m. I worked 18 stations in about 45 minutes. It was never busy but the contacts included most of the DX of this afternoon with W2, W4, RV9 and JL1.
I changed down to 20m and worked another 55 OMs in one and a half hours. Again not very busy but that leaves time to have some longer QSO's. The DX on this band consisted of KA2, VE4 and RV9. 

In total I logged 73 calls from 25 DXCCs. The maximum QRB of this activity was set by a JL1 station to 9300 km. Roberto IK1DFH, Mario IW1QEA and Alexander RV9UCN came by on both bands.

About two thirds of the callsigns logged were new to me. This shows me that the chasers of the WCA award only partily overlap with the chasers of flora and fauna references (where usually only one third of the callsigns are new).

Thanks all for giving me a call.

73,
Lars / PH0NO/P

2 comments:

  1. Fantastisch Lars, mooie foto's. Toch nog redelijk wat verbindingen gemaakt dus. Oke, wat betreft die lijst dat ga ik binnenkort doen. Dus alleen objecten die er nog staan. Dat zal geen problemen opleveren. 73, Bas

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    1. Mooi! Als er nog een beetje een aardige ruine over is, dan is dat ook acceptabel. Helaas staan er ook de nodige op die niet meer zijn dan "verhoging in het landschap" (of helemaal onzichtbaar). Die mogen er dus af. Net als die oude benamingen.
      73, Lars.

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