Kevin K0KLB inspired me to do something new. I did my first Qrp Pota Activation.
I did a two-fer from K-5998 Horseshoe Sprint Wildlife Management Area and K-4566 California Historic Trail. I have done this activation once in the past.
Horseshoe Springs was a popular stopping place for people on the California Trail. There is water all year long at the spring.
The California Trail splits at this location. The Hastings Cutoff starts here. The cutoff was an alternative route for westward emigrants to travel to California went over the Sierra Nevada Mountains. The Donner Party used the Hastings Cutoff.
POTA Activation K-4578 and K-5998
I used my MFJ-1979 17ft telescoping antenna with a Buddipole coil on a mag mount on top of my car. I also used my Buddipole regular coil and large coils to improve SWR.
I turned down the power on my FT-857D to 5 watts.
I started on 20 meters and my first contact was with K0KLB. We chatted and he gave me a 57 into IA. I was impressed. I made 20 QSOs on 20 meters.
The band started to fade so I moved to 40 meters. It started okay I was able to get two QSOs in a couple of minutes and then the band totally died. So just two QSOs on 40 meters. One in NM and the other in CA.
It was really fun doing my first QRP Pota Activation and looking forward to doing more in the future.
POTA Contacts
For this activation I made a total of 22 QSOs with three P2P. I felt I did pretty good with the band conditions they way they were.
Parks on the Air Logging
I just bought a car laptop holder from Amazon and found it works fairly well. This allowed me to be able to do all of my logging on the computer.
I use N3FJP Amateur Contact Log for logging my Pota contacts. I have modified the form to accept the POTA entity number I am working from and a field for any Park-to-Park QSOs.
I want to do more QRP POTA activations. Next time I will go higher into the mountains to see if it helps.
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Thank you for all of those who hunted me. Also a big thanks to all of the Parks on the Air Spotters. Without you a POTA Activation is hard to be successful.
