12/16/2003 | G3TXF Worked 500 Q's on first day and 423 Q's on second.

On both Saturday and Sunday the majority of US stations were worked with the antenna pointing to South America. Signals were nearly always better on this skew path than they were direct.

Worked only one (extremely thin) W6 in CA (K6AM) and no W7's worked at all. Nothing heard from Japan. The furthest DX to the east was VI8NT (VK8) and the furthest to the south-west was CE3BFZ.

Although the band initially went flat within an hour of our sunset [1610z] on the Saturday, there was an odd further opening to the US and the Caribbean from about 1915z to 2030z on the Saturday. Signals were weak, but they were 'direct'. Most of the QSOs with the Caribbean were made during this odd (three to four hours AFTER our sunset) second opening. The same opening didn't happen on the Sunday.

Bye bye 10 metres .... see you again during the next sunspot cycle!

The antenna [4el 10m yagi at 75ft] was installed on a crank-up tower specifically for the contest. Operated from North Devon contest/holiday location. Station FT-1k-MP and Quadra amp. -- G3TXF