Yesterday.. I got the chance to get on in the early afternoon.. I did not hear anyone on any band save for a few Florida QSO Party participants Other than those guys', the bands were just noise. I went to the POTA spotting page and saw my friend Brian KB9BVN listed as doing an activation - could not hear him. I heard a few weak signals that must have been working him, but I did not hear him.

Also, I normally have a pipeline down into Georgia and Virginia. I couldn't hear anyone from those states. The St. Max Net at 8:00 PM wasn't much better. I heard Lloyd K3QNT, the Net Control  Station alright, but most of the net participants were down in the mud.

I had planned to go over to the Edison Memorial over in Menlo Park to do a POTA activation as the weather was so beautiful yesterday. I'm glad I checked the bands, first. It would have been an exercise in frustration. Maybe next weekend, if the weather holds up.

I took the opportunity to hook my bug up to the computer and let the Ham Radio Solutions bot decode my CW.  Surprisingly, I didn't do all too badly and after about 1/2 hour pf practice I was sending without hardly any errors at all. I'm still not ready to go "live on the air" with it yet, but I'm happy that I'm not too far off.  The hardest part was to remember that the Dahs are not automatically made like with a paddle and keyer. Once you remember that, it becomes a lot easier. 

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!  

A Coronal Mass Ejection (or other solar phenomena) has rendered the bands positively yucky today. But for the limited amount of time that I spent behind the key today, I still managed to snare six POTA stations for the log.

WD8RIF at US-1994

K2EAG at US-1619

KU8T at US-1637

WI2X at US-1611

AE4WX at US-6962

W0ABE at US-10533

All contact were made on 30 and 20 Meters. I heard EA4HCF calling CQ on 17 Meters and I tried answering, but no joy at 5 Watts. For the heck of it, I tried bumping up the KXPA100 to 85 Watts, just to see if I could make contact. Nope - that tells you that the bands truly did bite. I usually rarely have a problem reaching Spain with 5 Watts, let alone 85 Watts.

Last week the POTA powers-that-be changed all the designators from "KA" to "US". Earlier in the month, they changed Canada from "VE" to "CA" and all of Great Britain from "G" to "GB". Not exactly sure what was the reasoning, but I'm sure they had a good one.

It will be interesting to see if I hear anyone on the St. Max Net tonight on 75 Meters.

I was going to go out today and play around with the Buddistick on top of the Jeep, using that magmount  on which I replaced the coax cable. It's in the upper 40s and normally, that wouldn't be too terrible. We're getting a steady breeze and wind gusts that are making it downright uncomfortable to be outside. This is the day after that Nor'Easter blew through here yesterday, dropping 2.72 inches of rain on my QTH. I'm hoping that maybe next weekend will be warm enough for me to run some quick tests without allowing my hands to go numb.

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!