SWMBO wasn’t satisfied with a couple of her videos as they came out too dark. She did a factory reset on her camera and suggested we go and retake the videos. She also suggested that we activate Sweet Run in VA SP US-9936 as it was close to where she wanted to go. Not a problem. We drove down to Sweet Run first. It is a small and quiet park located just a few miles from Harpers Ferry WV. We had a nice drive down there and got set up quickly. My typical routine is to decide which band to operate then put the appropriate antenna on the roof in a mag mount. Next I place my radio, an FT891 by Yaesu, on the dashboard and connect it up to my battery. I use a 20ah LiFePo battery which gives me adequate operating time. I then find an empty frequency. Sometimes I find a place and part way through my activation I get informed that a net is going to start soon. I then find another spot. Most times the person is polite when they ask. I am a net manager for a local club net and have no issues giving precedence to a net. Anyway, once I pick a frequency, I start calling using my voice recorder on my radio. It saves my voice. SWMBO does the logging and we have found that 2 sets of ears are better than one at picking out weak signals. I am constantly adjusting my AF volume to accommodate signals that are hard to hear and to keep my “interference” to other park users to a minimum. One thing I make sure to do is to acknowlege the 10th contact and thank the hunter for making my activation bonafide. Back to today. We got set up and then on the air. In about 1/2 hour we made 34 contacts (35 really but one was a duplicate). By then it was getting too hot to be comfortable. The humidity was also high. I thought we would get some rain but the ridge to the East of us seems to have blocked it. Once we tore down we walked around the park. I took a video in the pollinator garden which I will link to below. We left the park and scooted over to Gathland SP. It was too hot to do an activation. SWMBO did her video thing and we went down the hill to Burkittsville, MD where she did another video. We stopped at Lincoln Diner in Gettysburg, PA for a great lunch and went home. Now I am sitting here drinking coffee and having face time with my cats. I will be participating in one net (Black Swamp Amateur Radio Club) via Echolink and then running our local one later on. Well, namaste for now, kidlets.



