The bands have been pretty good lately. I was down at WA2HOM this morning from 10am to noon and really had a blast.
When I first got there, I tuned around a bit on 20m. 20m sounded to be in pretty good shape, so I decided to see if 15m was open. I pointed the beam at Europe, tuned around a bit, and was disappointed not to be hearing much. Nevertheless, I set up on 21035 kHz and started calling CQ. In short order, I worked R1DX (who had a true 599 signal), OH8MBN, and IZ5RKC.
After that, I QSYed back down to 20m and started looking for stations working the International Lighthouse Lightship Weekend operating event. Since the band was in such good shape, I worked lighthouses/lightships all over the country, including:
- W1SYE, Newport, RI. Goat Island Lighthouse
- K2VN, Long Island, NY. Horton Point Lighthouse
- K6PV, near Los Angeles, CA. Point Vicente Lighthouse
- W3LRS, Lewes, DE. Overfalls Lightship
- W6A, San Pedro, CA. Point Fermin Lighthouse
The QSO with K6PV was fun because as it turned out, Bob, the operator there, is a graduate of the University of Michigan, and we had a nice chat about Ann Arbor, our QTH and the home of U-M. Also, as it turned out, Bob’s own call is W6HIP, which fits nicely into my collection of QSL cards from stations whose call signs spell words. I’ll be sending off two cards to him, one from WA2HOM and one from KB6NU, tomorrow.
Bas PE4BAS says
Hi Dan, I’ve been chasing lighthouses and ships as well last weekend. Unfortenately did not hear a single activation from the USA. However I did work WP4I from Culebra Isl. lighthouse. 73, Bas