Today, I packed the /P station into the car and headed out to Port Huron’s Pine Grove Park. One of the reasons for doing this was to activate the Lightship Huron, which is docked in the St. Clair River, very near where Lake Huron flows into the river. The Lightship Huron was the last operating lightship on the Great Lakes, and served for over 50 years when she was retired in 1970.
The second reason was to participate in the International Lighthouse and Lightship Weekend (ILLW). I’ve participated in this event several times. Last year, I operated from the Pointe aux Barques Lighthouse. The two years previous, I ventured over to Canada and joined the Elmira (ON) Radio Club (ERC) as they activated the Point Clark Lighthouse.
The third reason was to enjoy the company of members of the Eastern Michigan Amateur Radio Club, They just happened to be holding their annual picnic today.
It’s an hour and a half drive from my home in Ann Arbor to Port Huron. I left home just after 9 am, got to Pine Grove Park, which is a beautiful park, by the way, a little after 10:30 am, and got set up by about 11 am, Pine Grove Park has many tall trees, and it was quite easy to get my antenna up into one.
The weather conditions were perfect. It was sunny and in the low 80s, with a northeaster breeze coming off the lake. Unfortunately, the radio conditions were far from perfect.
Unlike my experience in the ILLW last year, I didn’t make a single contact on 20m, despite hearing many strong European stations. They just couldn’t hear me.
I had better success on 40m, but the CW portion of the band was pretty dead. I made 4 out of 7 contacts on phone, mirroring my experience a couple of weeks ago at the Pointe aux Barques Lighthouse. And, if it wasn’t for POTA activators, I wouldn’t have even made those four contacts. All four were activating parks. One was also activating a lighthouse, making that contact my only lighthouse-to-lighthouse contact of the day.
While I was disappointed that I didn’t make more contacts, I still had a lot of fun. It was enjoyable being outside, and the folks from EMARC were great company. It’s on my calendar to do this again next year.