SOTA- Brown Clee Hill (G/WB-002) 15th February 2013

Encouraged by the Trans Atlantic QSOs the previous day on Callow Hill, I set out to activate Brown Clee Hill again, one of the 2 SOTA Summits I can see from my house 🙂

After parking next to the phone box / library as normal, I kitted up and walked up the bridleway, being somewhat surprised to find 2-3 foot snowdrifts at the top!

Successfully circumventing these, and finding the bog at the top pleasantly frozen over 🙂 I eventually made it to the top.

view from the activation point

View from the activation point towards Titterstone Clee Hill

I quickly setup the 44′ Norcal Doublet on the fishing pole and plugged it into the 817ND. Then…   I couldn’t find the cable to connect the rig to the 7AH SLAB.. Quickly remembering it was still lying on the hall floor back at home 🙁  GAH!!

It seemed that the internal batteries were fully charged in the rig, so I thought I’d give it a go, at 2.5W SSB, HF only, not wishing to take it all apart again, go home, return, and repeat the procedure!

I struggled to add a spot to sotawatch, adding ‘quick activation only 2.5W’ to it!

The rig managed to last an hour and a quarter (probably longer, but 2.5W wasn’t getting heard to most places) and 21 QSOs, including 2 Trans Atlantic ones again 🙂  One of whom called later, wanting to confirm that I was, in fact, running 2.5W!

Many thanks to all the chasers:

12:39z EA1LQ 14MHz SSB Ernesto Spain
12:39z N4EX 14MHz SSB Richard NC USA
12:40z OK2BUT 14MHz SSB Jan Czech Republic
12:41z OM1AX 14MHz SSB Vlado Bratislava
12:42z G6WRW 14MHz SSB Carolyn Kidderminster
12:43z OE7PHI 14MHz SSB Holger Austria
12:44z W4ZV 14MHz SSB Bill NC USA
12:59z G6WRW 7MHz SSB Carolyn Kidderminster
13:00z G4AFI 7MHz SSB Andrew Hants
13:00z G4ZRP 7MHz SSB Brian NW England
13:01z G4WSB 7MHz SSB Bill Swindon
13:01z G4UXH 7MHz SSB Colin Cumbria
13:03z M0MDA 7MHz SSB Mick Leeds
13:04z F5UBH 7MHz SSB Christophe France
13:05z PA0B 7MHz SSB Rob Netherlands
13:07z MW0IML 7MHz SSB Barry Wales
13:08z G0RQL 7MHz SSB Don Devon
13:11z ON4KCY 7MHz SSB Yves belgium
13:22z G1PIE 7MHz SSB Mark Preston
13:50z G0TRB 7MHz SSB Roger Staffordshire
13:55z MM0GPL 7MHz SSB Chris Scotland

Struggling to get any more contacts, it was time to pack it all away, and negotiate the snow drifts back down to the comfort of the car!

Masts on Brown Clee

Masts and the toposcope on Brown Clee Hill