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2012 ARRL Field Day

06/26/2012 | WA1VMI

My 12 YO son Stefan and I roved from our house in NJ to the Westchester Emergency Communications Association site where Larrie W2UL and Norm N2GKM were in a park in the middle of the harbor in Mamaroneck, NY to the Garden State ARA site (where we missed N2DR by an hour) in Tinton Falls, NJ, to the W2IMU operation in Tom W2EQ's backyard (we camped there overnight) to the Ocean-Monmouth ARC operation at Camp Evans, then we toured the Infoage museum at Camp Evans, then back home. We traveled 270 miles, operating at each site as well as HF mobile (Class 1C) in regions ENY, NNJ and SNJ and we had an absolute blast! The setup at WECA was incredible, over $1M equipment, Class 4A + GOTA multiple HF beams on temporary towers to 80', VHF & UHF beams, multiple HF wire beams and other antennas, stellar food, views, location, people, we were there from 1 PM - 6 PM Sat and we had fun operating the GOTA (Get On The Air) station, which was set up and hosted by Larrie. Norm graciously arranged personal tours of both of the brand new emergency communications vehicles by himself and other individuals who configured them.  We visited the GSARA site at the Red Cross building in Tinton Falls, NJ from 9 - 11:30 PM, again treated and fed well and again had a great time operating the GOTA station. We arrived at Tom's house around midnight, finding Gerry Kersus W1GD at the key. After Gerry left, Tom operated about 1 AM - 6:30 AM with another ham whose name/call escapes me at the moment; (Eric?) who had his sharp 10 YO nephew Chandler KD2BLA with him. Bob W2VE arrived at 5:58 AM and we operated together until about 10:30 AM (Tom sorry, we probably killed your average QSO rate but you were a good sport and we had a good time) Forty meters was on fire, I was working stations stacked like cordwood--300 Hz apart on SSB!) Tom, thanks for the hospitality and the memories! At the Diana / Camp Evans site we were once again treated like honored guests, more operating and free refreshments, and they were happy to have Stefan increment their GOTA score. I cannot fail to add that the visit to the InfoAge museum was amazing, we were treated to one-on-one tours at exhibit after exhibit by extremely knowledgeable and interesting people, we spent three and a half hours there and it was an incredible trip down memory lane, they must have had 30 items on exhibit of that I have owned over the years, I could only conclude that I must be a fossil by now yet I left a good donation; anyone reading this who hasn't been there should add a visit to their must-do list whether they are a radio aficionado or not. This was a great experience for both myself and Stefan, unforgettable father-son time and perfect exposure of Ham Radio for Stefan.  It's been many years since I operated Field Day.  A big thank you to all who made this experience possible!

Peter WA1VMI Boonton, NJ -- WA1VMI


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