Hi!
Another Saturday not in the summertime, another Arizona hamfest, and another road trip to different parts of the state. Yesterday was a fun day, with perfect weather for the Old Pueblo Radio Club's hamfest in Tucson yesterday morning, followed by a few hours in southeastern Arizona working satellites from the DM51bx/DM52ba grid boundary, and a drive out to a different spot in the rarely-heard grid DM53 in eastern Arizona.
Saturday morning at the hamfest was crowded. More people seemed to be out this year than at last year's hamfest. The parking lot used for the hamfest was full, if that's any gauge (it hasn't been, for the past few years since I started going to this hamfest). For the first time since I've been representing AMSAT at hamfests in almost 5 years, all of my satellite demonstrations were done on the SSB birds.
With AO-51's pass times gradually moving earlier and earlier as the years have passed, and SO-50 not passing by in the morning except for one pass that overlapped an AO-7 pass, I made good use of both AO-7 and VO-52. AO-7 was in mode B, and that - along with the reliable VO-52 - made great impressions on the people watching. Thanks to the stations that called and worked me during the morning, and I apologize if I missed some of you on those passes.
By 11am (1800 UTC), the hamfest was almost vacant. I packed up my stuff, stopped for a quick lunch down the street from the hamfest, then it was off to the DM51bx/DM52ba grid boundary just over an hour away from Tucson. I was able to get out there in time for the AO-27 pass around 2006 UTC, and have lots of time to spare. Working 5 passes (two each on AO-27 and AO-51, plus an AO-7 pass) while enjoying the Saturday afternoon in southeastern Arizona was enjoyable. Even the time between passes after updating my logbook doing nothing more than sitting back and listening to some music before the next pass.
After the last AO-51 pass around 2330 UTC, I had almost 2 1/2 hours before the SO-50 pass I planned to work at the DM52ax/DM53aa grid boundary. As I was driving up toward DM53, I started poking around on my sat-nav system and noticed that I might be able to help a couple of other satellite operators work a very rare Arizona county via satellite and still be in grid DM53.
Greenlee County, along Arizona's eastern border with New Mexico, is the smallest in population (less than 8000). Its county seat, Clifton, has about half of that - and a big copper mine. Most of the town is hemmed in by mountains, but I was able to find a dirt road off the main highway (US-191, the Coronado Trail - previously known as US-666) in grid DM53ia that kept me up higher than most of Clifton and have a better shot at working the two passes I planned for - SO-50 at 0155 UTC, followed by VO-52 at 0220 UTC.
Once I heard SO-50, I was able to work stations from central Mexico and all across the USA in about 10 minutes. Many were happy with the DM53 QSO, and a few got the one Arizona county that had eluded them on the satellites. VO-52 a few minutes after the SO-50 pass was also good. I'm still working on my log for those two passes, but I was able to work stations from start to finish on each pass. A good way to wrap up the radio part of my quick road trip.
After finishing up the radio operating, it was back in the truck for a drive home of almost 4 hours including a fuel stop. Including my drive to Tucson on Friday evening in advance of the hamfest, this was a 524-mile (843km) road trip and activity from 4 grids (hamfest was in grid DM42me, along with the DM5x grids activated after the hamfest). I looked at my APRS track for the trip, and I am happy to see that my entire trip was picked up by the APRS network out here. Lots of mountaintop digipeaters, and many APRS gateways to feed the APRS RF network into the Internet, here in Arizona.
For those that missed out on working me in those grids, I will be back in Tucson for another hamfest in the spring (late March or early April, date hasn't been determined yet) and a hamfest in Sierra Vista (southeast of Tucson) in May. I take advantage of these events to visit the grids in southeastern Arizona that are rarely heard on the satellites, and I plan on doing it again for those two events next spring. If there are any county hunters that would like to hear Greenlee County on the birds again, I might be able to plan another road trip in that direction.
Time to finish updating my log from last night, and then printing up more QSL cards.... and, yes, this was fun. :-)
73!
Patrick WD9EWK/VA7EWK http://www.wd9ewk.net/
P.S.: The Arizona Worked All Counties award is available for those who make contacts with all 15 Arizona counties. Contacts via satellite are specifically permitted. I have now been on the satellites from 14 of the 15 counties over the past few years, and Leo W7JPI is on from the county I have yet to operate from (Santa Cruz County). Information about this award is at: http://www.w7yrc.org/az-wac.htm