06/17/2008 | W7GK Was not expecting much in the way of propagation this time around. Certainly no Es but the weather patterns have been odd lately so hoped for some tropo. Thought if we made 30 contacts over the weekend we'd be lucky. Sept. 2007 was a total failure and June 2007 wasn't much better from northeastern Nevada. The nearest cities are Boise to the north, Salt Lake City to the east and to west of us is Reno. All about 250 to 350 miles away with several mountain ranges blocking line of sight so 6 meters has to open or we're skunked.

Arrived on Rocky Point at 8200' MSL in grid DN21 on Friday. Spent the day erecting the antenna, running hardline and rotor cable then getting the station set up in the trailer. It's quite a haul up there on a dirt trail but the trailer is a small single axle job and the truck has lots of horsepower.

We have 22 elements on 432, 4 elements on 6 and 11 elements on 2. We use a triplexer at each end of the " hardline. The rig is a Yaesu FT-847. We can errect the antenna in about 1 hours, the solar panels fit into a homemade frame and that along with the rest of the setup takes about 4 hours to get going.

XYL, W7BDY, always comes with but she closes her eyes or gets out and walks when the trail gets bad. She was one of the last to pass the code to get her General but doesn't care for operating in contests. She just enjoys relaxing and being out in the middle of nowhere. She did make some contacts during a Skywarn Recognition Day so maybe there's hope for a multi operation someday.

Saturday started out a bummer. 6 opened up briefly right around 1100 local and we made one contact into Minnesota. It died and that was that. Then around 1700 local it opened again and we made another 35 contacts. Took aim at the Wasatch Front in Utah, about 180 miles easterly, and worked WJ7L on 6, 2 and 432 - hey, met my minimum expectations for the weekend. Band closed around 2030. Thought maybe we'd snag a few more contacts on Sunday. We have to start tearing down around 1400 to get home just before dark.

Woke up Sunday morning around 5 AM local, watered and fed the dogs then listened. Nothing, but there never has been until after 1000 local. Then something new. Started hearing brief signals around 0700. It's usually the way it works. A syllable here and there followed by an opening. 6 opened around 0800 then pandemonium struck. All grid sqares east of the Rockies, north of the Gulf and south of Canada piled in until noon. Then came the DM's and DN's until 1330. One of the last contacts made was with KU7Z on the Wastach using 6, 2 and 432. Very last one was with VA2SG.

We've been going up these northeastern Nevada mountain tops for years and a good VHF contest weekend nets around 100 QSO's but this weekend we netted 230 contacts in at least 100 grid squares. It was absolutely awesome - something totally unexpected.

Great weekend. Thanks everyone for the contacts.

73,
Dave, W7GK & Kathy, W7BDY -- W7GK