Based on finding out after I returned home from our Powhatan State Park camping trip in May that that park requires a special use permit for amateur radio operations, I called ahead to Lake Anna State Park to find out if I needed one for our camping trip there this month. As it turns out, there is no such requirement for obtaining a special use permit to play with our radios with the Lake Anna State Park. So, I packed up all my radio gear and carried it with me when my XYL and I drove down to the lake for a weekend of tent camping.
Sadly, the weekend turned out to be one of the hottest weekends we’ve had in a long time. The outside temperature touched the upper 90s all weekend long. This situation was exacerbated by very little air movement. While I was hoping to work a lot more on air during our stay, the heat kept me from doing so except in the early hours of Saturday, when I managed to activate via FT8 on 20 meters, and I attempted to activate the park on 20 meters single-sideband as well, but the 20 meter band was standing room only. It was too hot to spend much time tuning and retuning the vertical antenna to work any other bands so I gave up.
I did manage to toss up my N0APX End-Fed Biscuit antenna finally and tune it. I may have made a rookie mistake and accidentally trimmed a bit too much off the end of the wire. I’m pretty close to resonate on 20 meters with it, but on the short side of the band by a hair. The RigExpert put the highest SWR for 20 meters around 2-to-1, so nothing a tuner can’t handle, but I’d probably not get the best of experiences with the QMX. If push comes to shove, I may take the wire off and put a new one on. The antenna appears really simple to build.
Not much of an activation, but it counts for a new park in my activation list, so I’ll take it.
Until next time, 73.
K2MAS
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