Mt Ainslie VK1/AC-040 Wednesday 30th June 2021

Wait… What? Wednesday? What the?

It is not often I have the opportunity to go bush (well… to a summit) mid week. Thanks to the quirks of working as an ADF Reservist, I found myself at a loose end with the change of Financial Year – and an opportunity to take some time off. I had hoped to head out of town, even activate a wheat silo ( look up SiOTA – Silos On The Air.. a new game in portable radio operations , but the nearest recognised silo is several hours drive away in surrounding NSW, and under the current COVID situation I decided against it…

My motivation for this activation was provided by Andrew VK1AD who made the call for others to join him on air whilst he ventured down Boboyan Road to activate Pheasant Hill. So after I put my hand up, so did many others and suddenly we had an EOFY VK1 SOTA party with at least seven of us heading for the hills… Sadly for Andrew he discovered that access to Pheasant Hill was obstructed by major road work… so, while an S2S opportunity was also denied, Andrew did find a suitable VKFF park to activate , so not all lost – and we exchanged reports on 2m simplex ..

I dared the mask wearing “public area” of Mount Ainslie – however a mask, while readily at hand, was not needed as the place was deserted. I had one person stand a respectable 5 metres away while I explained the fishing rods and dits and dahs coming from my radio… Other than that, I enjoyed a remarkably warm sunny morning.

As we all ‘Alerted’ for similar start times 146.5 FM was predictably busy – requiring a little bit of circuit discipline not to trample each other! What a great fun morning.

My log – a total of 20 QSOs including 9 S2S contacts, with a good mix of 11 FM simplex and 9 CW 40m and 20m contacts including VK2 VK1 VK3 and ZL.

Thanks to Andrew VK1AD (I was at least able to provide a Park to Park contact!), Mat VK1MF, Doug VK1DJ ( and as ZDJ), Andrew VK1DA, Chris VK1CT, Ian VK1DI, Gerard VK2IO, Allen VK3ARH, Peter VK2PET, Lilly VK2LIL, Wallis VK2WP, Wade VK1MIC, Matt VK1MA, Roly ZL1BQD, John ZL1BYZ, Andrei ZL1TM and Wynne ZL2ATH.

Radio -HF/CW the KX-2 connected to an EFHW ( 6 through 80m) and the trusty FT-817 for 2m connected to the increasingly popular, easy to build 2m ‘Oblong Loop’ antenna. Look it up on Andrew’s page here – https://vk1nam.wordpress.com/tag/2m-oblong-loop-antenna/

Only one photo ( it must be the most photographed summit in VK) and that was an afterthought during the pack up!! Sorry!!

I might have to take more Wednesdays off – these mid-week activations are a great idea! Thanks again Andrew!