My Dayton Experience Day 2

I'm tired. We are packing for our flight home and the day was long. The kind of day when hours really stretch. I found my paddles for portable operating, purchased a few tools, and googled over high frequency gear inside the swap fest.

I met operators from around the world and briefly chatted with most of them. My Dayton experience was #hamr fun and it was off the hook meeting David, K2DSL at the contest dinner!

Ham radio is shackadelic.

My Dayton Experience Day 1

Greetings from my hotel room after a full day inside and outside of Hara Arena. The mob from the Central Coast of California that is John, W6SL, Chas, W6UM, Dick, W6TK and I are getting ready for some shut eye before another day at Hara. The weather is totally right on with partly cloudy skies and warm temperatures.

We concentrated on the small and difficult to find on the Central Coast like connectors, ferrite chokes, grounding straps, and coax.  The #hamr heavies are in town like Icom, Kenwood, Yaesu, and Elecraft. I spoke with Scott, W4PA of Vibroplex and Spiderbeam USA and Sue, WA1S of Icom who is the first woman to operate on Clipperton Island.

My experience for today has left me exhausted and ready for bed. I have my Contest Dinner ticket for tomorrow night and we are planning another intense day inside and outside of Hara Arena. I met KL7RA, WG0AT, K1ZZ, K8AZ, K1DG, K1EA, W0YK, and spoke with Bob Heil as well. HamNation is live!

Turn on, tune up, and operate.

My #hamr Weekend Update

Greetings from the couch where Radio Dawg is snoring and Kimberly is watching golf on the tube. How was your #hamr weekend? I logged a pair of Qs on high frequency yesterday afternoon and verified LoTW Qs plus eQSLs.

My basic 50 Worked All States (CW Only) arrived in the mail. I'm stoked because it is an accomplishment well worth the butt-in-the-chair time. The award was fun to pursue and I have joined the club of over 55,000 plus who accomplished the same. The next goal is notching each of the five bands culminating in the League's 5Band WAS.

PJ2 confirmed in the mail and it is my third country toward 5Band DXCC and my 68th toward the first one hundred.

Lastly, I'm going to Dayton this year and looking forward to our #hamrhack of a good time. Finally, I can meet founding bloggers, chat with RadioSport athletes, collect ham radio swag, and absorb propagated forum knowledge. I'll have my #droid with me and monitoring Twitter traffic is top priority in addition to near real time blogging. Also, I'll look out for those wearing unique hardhats as well.

One more item, what is the buzz regarding Bob Heil, Leo Laporte, This Week In Technology, and HamNation?

73 and see you in Dayton!

My 10,000 Hour RadioSport Challenge | 9,656 - 4 = 9,652 Hours To Go

Right on for Cycle 24 as sunspots continue enriching our high frequency experience. I'm having ham radio fun when the weekend rolls into Shell Beach and I can turn on, tune up, then operate my wireless set. It signals the beginning of another weekend adventure surfing radio waves.

I've stacked a few RadioSport events since my last challenge post with a continuous string of triple digit solar flux indice reports going into the log as well. I have noticed a dramatic drop off of activity on Sunday afternoons with Friday night and all day Saturday as the core of activity at least as heard inside shackadelic.

The menu of recent activity included the Florida QSO Party, 7th Call Area QSO Party, and CQ M.

My score was not a Box qualifier neither was my score even close to the Box. The goal was experience as four hours fell off my challenge. I'm learning to listen while searching and logging. Admittedly, my low power, low profile station with its antenna system sandwiched between a pair of condos isn't a rate station. Rather, my station  pushes the next station a little further toward the Box.

Ham radio can be shackadelic.