I worked the contest after hiking up to the castle on SOTA summit W1/HH-002 Mt. Carmel, operating portable at 50W with my IC-706MKIIG on 2m only with a fantastic G4DHF 5 element wire beam.  29F with a steady blowing wind and after hiking up I was exposed on the top of the "viewing castle" on Mt. Carmel in Sleeping Giant State Park. 

  I worked K1TEO right off the bat, he wasn't too hard to work and then I heard some weak stations but I couldn't work them.  15 min of voice keying and still nothing when I finally noticed that I had not connected the coax to the back of the rig!  I don't know if it was the rock solid finals in the rig or the low temps, but the rig was undamaged and once I connected the coax the band came alive...imagine that!