Hamlin Hike
October 2019

Tim W3ATB and I took an afternoon hike in Hamlin Forest in Meredith.
We walked over a mile, sat down on a rock, and worked G3VBS in South
Yorkshire.



It was a glorious October day with the fall colors a little past peak, and the temperature
soared to nearly 60F. The large forest is near Wicwas Lake. We stopped after a while and
tossed our line into some beech trees. Tim set up the KX2 on a flat rock that was covered
with damp moss. I took the first turn at the key.



We heard a couple of fairly strong stations, but they couldn't hear us. We switched to
30 meters and heard Tom G3VBS calling CQ. He came back to us, but gave us a 229.
Tim quickly laid out a counterpoise and our signal to Tom came up enough that he
copied everything. When I told him we were hiking, he asked about the rig and the
antenna. He was running 100 watts to a Rhombic and had a 579 signal.

After I finished, Tim sat down at the operating position.



He called a Danish station sending a CQ, and immediately the battery went dead! Darn... I drained
all the electrons on the UK contact. Then Tim confessed that he hadn't charged the battery since
returning from Puerto Rico. We had a good laugh and hiked back to the car. There won't be many
more of these days before the cold weather arrives.