April Sans Showers

April 7, 2026 / KB3CVO / Leave a comment

Howdy kidlets. Had a nice couple of days off. Got 2 more activations in, did some banking, did some shopping and interacted with the kitties.

The weather the last couple of days was nice-ish with temperatures hitting 9C yesterday (48 F) and 10C today (50F). Yesterday the sun was trying to hide but came peeping out now and then. Today it was just plain sunny which made it nice sitting in my car.

Yesterday I made 30 contacts from Big Spring State Park US-4335 and it brought me closer to 1000. Today I made 21 contacts some on 40M and some on 15M. I worked a station from Italy and one from Spain. Those 2 contacts were higher in signal level than some from the US. I tell people that any signal report I receive is a good one. It all depends on what the bands are doing. I worked from MD to WA in the US. I am not sure what our plans are for the upcoming weekend but there might be an activation.

One thing I can’t stress enough is safety. Keeping antennae away from power lines is one thing but keeping them out of the paths of people is just as important. When you are in a park you have to be aware of other people in the area. When I use my Buddi-pole I place cones around it and on the ground strip to keep folks away. I always look around for situations where people could endanger themselves on my equipment.

I am including a picture of my gear laid out even though I linked a video of it last time.

Well it is suppertime so I will say namaste to you and yours.

The mascots today including Tootsie the owl

Coltsfoot peeking through the leaf-litter

My gear laid out and being inspected by Kalamazoo

One of the fireplaces near the pavilions

Winter Decided To Show Up And Be Obnoxious

January 31, 2026 / KB3CVO / Leave a comment

Winter, an acquaintance from long ago, showed up the other day and is now drinking all your beer and couch-surfing. Last weekend we got a storm (Jan 23rd – 25th) that, though wasn’t crippling, caused the roads to be impassable from Saturday night until Monday morning. It has also turned brutally cold. I had to stay at work from Saturday afternoon until Monday morning. SWMBO was very helpful by going out every so often and shoveling away the berm left by the snowplows so that when I got home I could pull into the driveway. After I woke up we got out the shovels and snow thrower and cleared the driveway up. (Face it, Tom, you are getting too old for this shit.)

It is still cold today, Saturday the 31st. Temperature right now is -9C and has been about the same all day. We had set out this morning to run some errands and when we got back I discovered I had let the pellet stove run out. The temperature in the house had dropped to about 17.5C which is a bit chilly for my taste. I loaded up the stove and started it up, we put our groceries away, and I set off to Little Buffalo State Park US-1376.

Little Buffalo is located about 12 minutes away and is a nice place to activate. I am slowly working on 1000 contacts from there and get closer each time. SWMBO used her discretion and prerogative to stay home in the warmth, so I had to do my own logging. In less than 1/2 hour I worked 24 contacts on 40M and called it a day. It was just too cold out there and being next to a frozen lake did not help. I did interact with some friendly people. One man who was out for a walk asked me about my antenna and ham radio. Another parked next to me and we spoke about ice fishing. I also got to watch ice skaters swirling around.

Well now it is time to drink coffee and cuddle kitties. Namaste for now, kids!

Ollie the owl staring at me and wishing I would bring him in from the cold

Some are there to fish, some are there to skate

November? No Wonder!

November 23, 2025November 23, 2025 / KB3CVO / Leave a comment

Wow, time is fun when you are having flies (my favorite frog quote). A lot has happened since the 4th of November. I worked some extra days due to people taking off for various reasons. A 12 hour day isn’t too bad until you are doing 4 or more in a row. I did have 4 days off in a row but couldn’t go much of anywhere due to both SWMBO and I having massive colds. Mostly we hung around suffering.

Scout is doing good. He is getting bigger every day though he has a skin condition that we are treating. We had to take the clippers to him so his coat is rather ragged and patchy. lol He does like hanging around me, sleeping on my chest and following me whenever I walk about. I refer to him as my “motional sports cat”. He is getting on well with the rest of the tribe for the most part. Our oldest girl, the Dowager Mayhem, does her best to ignore him. Her brother, Foggy, plays with him a bit. Calamity and him seem to be getting on the best though he does play rough. I often find them sleeping next to each other. The pocket panthers, Kalamazoo and Dipper do like to play tag with him, chasing back and forth around the downstairs.

Today I used my antenna case for the first time. I got a fishing rod case and put my ham-sticks in it along with my mag mount. It is a lot easier to tote around and the antennae don’t bang around as much as they did in the PVC pipe.

So we went out today and activated the ATV lot in Michaux State Forest US-5471. It is a good spot to activate and the elevation really helps. It sits on the ridge above Pine Grove Furnace State Park though it is not part of the park. We were getting good reports for the most part. We did have to change frequency once as a net moved in above us but there is plenty of room on the bands for everybody. Mostly the folks running the nets are cordial and let you know that they are starting up. It was a bit chilly when we started with a temp of 3C but we were only there for about 40 minutes. In that time we were able to work 40 stations.

After we finished with the activation SWMBO wanted to go for a ride. We got on the back roads in Adams County and drove around for about an hour.

Well enough for now. As always, namaste kiddos.

My antennae case loaded up with antennae and mag mount

Moxie, Missie and Tootsie at the ATV lot

In Before It Got Too Hot

August 12, 2025 / KB3CVO / Leave a comment

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.

Ready to operate at Sweet Run State Park

Jupiter, Venus and Mercury aligned on 10 August 2025 just before dawn

One of the flower beds at Sweet Run State Park

Too Soon?

May 23, 2025 / KB3CVO / Leave a comment

I have found that the older you get, the quicker time goes by. I just finished a 4 day break from work. Another member of the team had to swap days with me as he had an obligation out of state to attend to. This means that my work schedule is a bit skewed. I was off for the past 4 nights and now I have to work for the next 4 nights. This did allow me to do some activations. I posted in a previous entry about not being in Hawaii but I went out on the 21st, also. It was a short, spur-of-the-moment activations. The bands were bad due to solar activity and I was only able to work 15 stations in an hour at Big Spring State Park US-4355. Before we had finished it started to rain so my owl got moist. I will be adding, either tonight or tomorrow night, a video of a train I took while sitting in the Lincoln diner, to my Youtube channel. You can find it at https://www.youtube.com/@gestyrious/videos. Anyway, I am sitting here drinking coffee and considering getting ready for work. I enjoy my job so that is no big thing but the hours do get long. A 12 hour shift can be a bit endless on the 4th consecutive night. I guess we all have to make our way as best we can and take the ups with the downs. SWMBO and I got some new action cameras so I might be adding more videos soon. In any event, it is Memorial Day Weekend so let us take a moment to think of those who sacrificed their lives to ensure our rights and freedoms. Well, one of my cats, Kalamazoo, is begging me for some treats so I better comply. For now and as always, namaste kiddos.

Ptolomey in the rain at Big Spring State Park

And It Rains as a Memorial

May 27, 2024 / KB3CVO / Leave a comment

Today is Pseudo-Memorial Day. I call it that as the real day of memorial was declared to be May 31st but politicians wanted to have a 3 day weekend so they changed tradition and changed the holiday into a meaningless day of sloth and bar-be-ques rather than remembering those who gave their lives for the service of this country. Okay, off of the soapbox lol. By now no one is reading this. lol. We had a bit of a scary and stressful time. Our oldest cat, Mote (age 10) has been losing weight and not acting himself. We feared the worst. We took him to the vet and he was diagnosed with a kidney infection and possible bad kidneys. We have now put him on a diet. This is much better than the cancer which we had feared. I was fully expecting to have to hold him as he crossed over, which I have done in the past for other furbabies. We are so happy that we have more time with him. Now on to more stuff. It is raining today. Very fitting. Friday we went to lunch at the Newville Diner and then activated King’s Gap SP. We made 15 contacts of which 3 were park-to-parks in about 45 minutes. Some people walked past us but no one stopped and asked us anything. Next we stopped off at State Game Lands 169. This is a nice quiet place and we worked 11 of which 6 were park-to-parks. Some of those I went hunting for as the propagation was not the best. We did not do any activations on Saturday but yesterday, Sunday, we went to the ATV lot in Michaux State Forest. We worked a total of 28 contacts and 8 of these were park-to-parks. I have decided that we need to get a sunscreen for the car. I covered the windshield part way with a shirt to screen the radio but my wyfe had to move her cell phone (which she uses to keep time) as it was getting very hot. I also need to keep a pair of gloves in the car as my mag-mount gets very hot. We were discussing on the way home where I could keep these gloves. If only the car manufacturers had designed some compartment in the cars to hold gloves. Maybe someone should suggest it to them. Well enough for now. I am going to stare at the rain and the go ride my stationary bike. Namaste kidlets.

Overlooking the Susquehanna

February 4, 2024 / KB3CVO / Leave a comment

Activated a new (to me) park today: K-1421 Shikellamy State Park. The name is almost pronounced like “she’ll kill me”. lol There are 2 parts to the park. One part is down at a boat launch on the river. The one we went to is located on top of a 120 meter high cliff overlooking the Susquehanna River. The view is remarkable. Since it was such a nice day, there was a lot of activity in the park, people walking and playing and enjoying an unusual February day. The lot where we were parked was pretty much deserted, which suited us. I placed my antenna on a slight rise towards a pavillion and started out working 20 meters. Between 20 and 40 meters I was able to make 37 contacts including 6 park to park. I will have to try this place again. When the weather is like this during the winter you really have to take advantage of it. Someone posed the question online why do people do POTA? I have to stick with the fact that it is a great way for chubby older hams to get outside and be active. I have always enjoyed the outdoors and though I am not in the shape I used to be in, I still like to get out and about. POTA gives me a reason. It also gives my long-suffering wyfe some togetherness time with me as she logs for me. It is a win-win situation. We plan on making more and more forays further from home as the weather improves and the days get longer. We would both like to go back up to Elk County and I might try a park or 2 up there. Who knows what time will bring. We are also looking forward to our yearly vacation and see these activations as practice runs for activations up in New England.

Well enough for now. Time to drink some coffee. Namaste, kidlets

Nature, Radio, and Me

A POTA Explorer's Diary

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