Waughton Hill
145 Alive!
The 145 Alive! event was planned for today between 1-3pm, which I wanted to join in with. Should be the perfect time to activate a summit on 2m! I had the three little kids with me for the day, so it had to be a easy summit. Particularly as I wanted to bring up the tent and lunch and things for them, to keep them entertained whilst I was on the air. The previous times I’ve brought them, I’ve only been about 20 minutes at most and trying to go much longer would be tricky. Eventually I want to qualify all the GM/ES summits, and so Waughton hill is on my list. It’s quite out of the way with nothing else nearby, so it’s a trip in itself and for one point, I’m not wasting a day off on it! It’s also the lowest summit in GM/ES, and seemed perfect for our adventure.
The path up is short, although does cross a field full of cows, and you soon find yourself by the white horse. Walk by its head and you’re on the top of the rise, and heading towards the old hunter’s cottage. The actual summit is a bit further away, requiring you to go down and up the side of the hill again. However, the hunter’s cottage is in the activation zone and the kids thought we’d reached the top and started playing in the house. There was also a nice piece of grass without any sheep or animal droppings on it for the tent I’d brought. The tent and mast went up easily enough and lunch and various toys were unloaded into the tent. It was about 12:55 and I wanted to be on the air for the start of the event, so I swallowed down my rolls and setup the IC-705. Turns out the coax on the slim G with the 6m tactical mini mast is just a little too short for the radio to be on the ground. I usually don’t notice as either using the carbon 6, where the antenna sits a little lower on it, or a HT which I’m holding at standing height. So I ended up having to hold the 705 in my hand the whole time.
I’ve not long had the IC-705 and whilst it is very simple to use, sometimes I get into some modes or settings that I don’t know how to get out of. Today I was already on 2m FM but would the VFO change the frequency? No. First I was worried I’d bashed it in my bag and the dial was broken, then thought perhaps I’d selected 10 or 100 Hz increment but that didn’t seem to matter. I ended up just pressing stuff and then going to band and choosing 144 MHz again seemed to fix it. Phew!
It was nice having the waterfall to see is there was any activity and there certainly was some! I knew MM0EFI and MM0RFN were going up Ben Macdui and Glas Maol respectively, but not sure if they’d got to the summit in time. Fraser was supposed to be on 145.250, so I tuned to it and heard Bill, GM0NRT, talking to someone but couldn’t hear the other end. I was worried I couldn’t hear Fraser on Ben Macdui, but turned out was just someone else. Tuning around, I heard a guy down at the car park by Hill of Garvock and ended up qualifying the summit with those on his net. I managed to work four summit to summits, two on Ben Macdui, Glas Maol and then Morven. I heard a station down in East Lothian calling on 145.500 but he didn’t hear my reply. After about an hour, I had 10 QSOs and thought it was about time we packed up.
We headed back down, and went to Aden Country Park for some more fun. Turned out to be an old timey tractor fair and there were loads of them on the roads as we drove there.
Was a fun day all round, and nice to join in with this event. Maybe next time I’ll try for a higher summit!
The guys up Ben Macdui had a fun trip.. Not jealous in the slightest…😅 Also afterwards, Chris, 2M0RVZ, was boasting about his points compared to mine…challenge accepted!