January VHF Contest 2023

 It was a beautiful day as I hiked up to Loma Alta (W6/NC-350), my usual VHF contest spot. I was worried it would be very muddy after all the recent rains, but the trail seems to have mostly dried out. The was water running in the trail, but it was in little erosion channels. The flat areas a little below the summit were more muddy, but my socks stayed dry.

Looking down Lucas Valley.

I was a bit worried it would be really busy since the parking area was totally full, but I didn't see that many people on the trail. Maybe everyone was going to Big Rock Ridge instead. It seemed like a long two miles to the summit, but I was carrying a lot of stuff.

Two of the antennas.

I brought my usual six-band setup. This includes yagis for 144, 222, 432, 920, 1296, and EDZs for 6m and 2m. Four radios, four transverters, and lots of connectors and coax. I'd bring 10GHz, but no one from the local microwave club ever seems to get on for this contest, so its not worth it. I've gotten good at setting it up, so I had some spare time before the start, which I used to make some 10m SOTA contacts. 

Extended Double Zepp pole.

The first hour of the contest was action packed, and I made lots of QSOs, particularly on 6m and 2m. After that it slowed down a lot. I'm not sure why activity was so slow this year. My best guess is that it was the first nice weekend of the year, and people were tired of being cooped up inside. So they went out instead of sitting at their radios.

As expected, 223 and 902 were not very active. Two meters provided the most contacts. It will be interesting to see how the scoring works out this year now that there are "all mode" and "analog only" subcategories. My guess is that single operator portable stations don't do much FT8, so the competition will be similar.

So much stuff to carry.

I took a break part way through to try out 12m. I did get a Japanese station, but there weren't many other takers. After some more calling on the VHF bands I eventually decided to pack it up. As I was taking down the 6m EDZ, on leg came off. It was nice of the antenna to break at the end of the day instead of during setup. I made it back to the car before sunset, which is unusual for me. 

I had plenty of time to let my mind wander since it was so slow. I definitely need to finish my Mountain Top VHF presentation and give it to the area clubs to try and drum up more activity. More QSOs means more fun for everyone! Overall, I'm claiming a score of 1,820, 63 QSOs and 20 mults. 

Here's hoping June will be better!