Hi!

On my way to the office this morning, I dropped a few dozen envelopes at the post office. I finished printing and writing out cards covering my trips over the last 3 weekends (7-11 October for the AMSAT Symposium and post-Symposium travel in/around Illinois, 16 October to a hamfest in Tucson AZ followed by a quick trip to DM51/DM52, and Saturday's quick trip to DM32/DM42 south of Phoenix) yesterday. They should start showing up in mailboxes over the next few days.

On Saturday, there were a group of Mexican hams operating on HF and satellites from grid DM30 south of the Arizona/Mexico border. I think that most of the satellite operating from there was done by Alex XE2BSS. If you worked XE2BSS and would like a QSL card, I am Alex's QSL manager. Please send those requests to me. I heard three other calls from that group on an SO-50 pass Saturday morning (David XE2DAK, Eliseo XE2TPJ, and Uriel XE2VAS). I don't know how active these 3 were on FM passes later in the day. Of those 3, I am also the QSL manager for XE2VAS. If you need assistance in getting cards from any of these 4, please feel free to e-mail me. I know all 4 of these guys, and may be able to help with the QSL exchange.

Over the past 2+ years, I have operated from every grid that covers the state of Arizona. For all of these grids except one, I have made multiple trips to those grids. I have only made one trip to DM31 in southern Arizona in September 2009, and have thought about making a return trip now that the summertime heat is done for the year. Most of DM31 is in Mexico, except for the northeast corner that reaches into the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument and the border town of Lukeville AZ where I operated from last year. I would probably make a return to Lukeville on a future trip. I don't currently have a Mexican ham permit, and - even if I had a valid XE permit - I'm not interested in crossing the Mexican border at that point. Since there are new operators coming onto the satellites all the time, and some (many?) may have missed my last trip down there. If there is any interest in another trip down to DM31, please e-mail me directly.

73!

Patrick WD9EWK/VA7EWK http://www.wd9ewk.net/