A good HF Sunday

 First, the QRP Image of the Day:

Taken from Facebook - love the photo! It's so this time of the year!

I managed to get on the air in the late morning. It was a productive session and yet disappointing at the same time. I worked seven different POTA stations on 20, 15 and 10 Meters. After I worked my last one, I saw TO8FH, Mayotte Island was spotted on, I forget right now, but it was either 15 or 10 Meters. I tuned to the frequency and they were decently loud. Not great, but not bad either. I figured that if I pumped up the KXPA100 a bit, I could probably work them.

The pileup behavior was absolutely atrocious! Between people not knowing how to go about working split, and the "Frequency Cops" sending "UP, UP", the DXpedition itself became inaudible. If I had gotten through and they had come back to me, I would not have heard them. So I did the best operating practice that I could think of - I turned the dial without even bothering to send my call even once..

Later in the evening, I checked into the St Max Net on 75 Meters. It was a good session with 18 stations checking in. Lloyd K3QNT, who is NCS, has a fantastic signal! He runs a tight, but welcoming and enjoyable ship, and it's good to listen to all who check in.

When the net closed, I noticed that the DX Cluster at the bottom of AC Log showed that the DXpedition to Swains Island W8S was spotted on 15 Meters.

I had a few minutes before K2VHW's Middlesex County Chat Net, so I decided to at least give a listen. To my astonishment, W8S was calling "CQ de W8S UP" with few if any takers! I took a stab that "UP" in this case would be about 2 kHz and gave them a call .......and got an immediate answer! An ATNO, a POTA station and an IOTA station in the log all in one shot!

A good day on HF ....... very good, indeed!

72 de Larry W2LJ

QRP - When you care to send the very least!