Third new one: PAFF-069

Four band activation of Ugchelen Hoenderloo

Knowing I had some time to spare at the end of the day yesterday I studied the map of PAFF-069 and found an operating spot that would allow enough room for setting up an extended fibreglass pole (for 40m). PAFF-069 is a forest, hence not the most friendly environment for setting up antennas.

Ugchelen Hoenderloo - PAFF-069

The weather was not very pleasant with rain and gusty winds. This makes operating from a park less attractive. On the other hand there are not a lot of people in the park with this kind of weather, assuring that there is at least some room left in the few open spots (free of trees) of the park.

The spot I selected on the map was very suitable so I was able to operate all bands including 40m. This time the antenna wire stayed in place even though the wind did its best to blow it of the extended pole (see picture).

Strong winds

I started out on 10m. Although I heard a couple of stations I did not work any. Going down to 15m activity level started to increase. It still was not very busy - logging 24 OMs in 20 minutes and DX was sparse. Bob WX4QN in Tennessee set the maximum QRB to 6900km.

On 20m activity was plenty as always. Signal levels were good although there was also little DX on this band. I logged 93 calls in about 50 minutes before going down to 40m. 40m was 200khz of QRM. Using two different frequencies - trying to get away from the QRM - I was able to log 25 calls in about half an hour. When I had enough of the QRM there was still some time left. So I tried 10m once again and logged one call from CN. Then I finished the actvity on 20m with another 30 contacts.

Operating spot @ PAFF-069

In total I logged 173 calls from 31 DXCCs in about 2 hours radio time. A lot of familiar OMs passed by. Sandro I0SSW and Luciano I5FLN came by on 3 bands. DX came in from W4, W1, UA9, UN, 4X and CN.

See you all next time.