POTA - who plays?

[N8YX]

Just did my first activation this past week. IC-703+ w/ 125ft wire up the side of a hill; LDG 9:1 matching network, a couple of counterpoises. We stayed at a cabin with friends and this was the best I could do with an hour and a half setup time for an antenna.

Took a tablet and other stuff to run FT8. Not much luck there but got good reports from a bunch of my local friends who shifted to 75M for the chance to put US1977 in their logs.

High noise level. I'm going to work on antenna deployment and see about finding a backpack which will accommodate everything including a slingshot throw-line launcher. There are probably 25 parks in a 15mi radius and better than half are situated in surroundings conducive for good antenna setups.

[W3WN]

Just did my first activation this past week. IC-703+ w/ 125ft wire up the side of a hill; LDG 9:1 matching network, a couple of counterpoises. We stayed at a cabin with friends and this was the best I could do with an hour and a half setup time for an antenna.

Took a tablet and other stuff to run FT8. Not much luck there but got good reports from a bunch of my local friends who shifted to 75M for the chance to put US1977 in their logs.

High noise level. I'm going to work on antenna deployment and see about finding a backpack which will accommodate everything including a slingshot throw-line launcher. There are probably 25 parks in a 15mi radius and better than half are situated in surroundings conducive for good antenna setups.

I heard you (you were spotted!). My antennas aren't working well on 75 though.

[N8YX]

I heard you (you were spotted!). My antennas aren't working well on 75 though.

A couple of the crew said I had lots of people calling me. But the noise was high to the point that most of the stations I was able to work were running in excess of 100w.

There are a couple portable vertical antennas I'm looking at for daytime activations - 10M through 40. If I can get a cabin in a needed park again I'll attack the 75/160M problem a little differently. First thing is experimenting with what I can loft, and what I can carry in a pack. I won't have a bucket truck available.