03/22/2008 | VP2VES I was able to get on the air as VP2VES for a short while on Sunday afternoon. QTH was Loblolly Beach on the north shore of Anegada island in the British Virgin Islands, operating field day style. I put up a homebrew vertical antenna about 15ft from the saltwater, and operated on a wooden bench under a thatch beach shelter. The rig was my FT-817 running off internal batteries. Initially I started at 2.5w before realizing it, then switched to 5w for most of my QSOs.
Sending CW and logging was done using GOLog software on a Palm III PDA and a Serial CW Sender keyer. This meant I had to enter each callsign and exchange into the Palm using a stylus and the Graffiti writing method, which requires precise and properly-ordered pen strokes to make the proper character. I.e., somewhat slow and easy to make errors that take a bit of time to correct. If my responses to calls seemed somewhat slow and awkward, this is why!

The pileup was HUGE and completely overloaded my receiver. Imagine a steady squeal due to all the stations calling once a QSO was finished. It was often difficult to pick out even a few characters. Once the pileup worked down some, the rate picked up quite a bit.

I enjoyed the short time I was able to operate, and look forward to next year and being able to devote more time to the contest!

More details are available at www.ak0m.com.
73, Steve -- AK0M