Got on the road quite early this morning and it was minus 1 c in Clare as I drove through the main street.

Finally made contact on 2m simplex with vk5is near Appila as the road from Clare to Jamestown is on the eastern side of the hills and simplex 2m is a bit difficult. Once near Booleroo I tried 6m fm and found Roger vk5nwe listening there so had a chat with him for a while along the road.

I arranged to meet Michael at 9.30 as he was shearing sheep and I found him hard at it but he hardly stopped to chat he just kept on sheering and gave me instructions at the same time . He seemed to get a sheep shorn in no time at all and grab another out of the catch pen.

After a few creek crossings I finally got the Colorado in 4×4 to tackle the track ahead. Much to my surprise the etrex found the first way point to be pretty close which was the gate at the top of the range where I turned left along the ridge.

That’s the Summit up there, I walked that ridge line from the western side last time I was here that is why I found a way in to the summit on the eastern side which is much more user friendly.  The track was a bit rocky and needed low 4×4 to make this ridge line but nothing to fear or worry about.

This is the view to the west out through Spear Creek with Mount Jay on the right and Mount Jay South is a little out of picture further south.

Just to make a hike I parked here and walked  along that track to the summit, it was a good place to park and I could turn around easier there.

That’s the summit ahead and Mount Brown off to the north so I did walk a kilometre or so to get there but it was a nice day for a stroll .

The shack with squidy on the fence strut . Hugh was out on se -003 and we managed to hook up on 2m via vk5rmn and work out a strategy because 40m was a total wipe out for short contacts . I called cq and started to get a few from the eastern states and act but signals were hard work . I had Nev qsy to 30m and we managed to work on low signal levels but got the reports done. All of a sudden Hugh was 5/7 on 40m again so the band did pick up locally so I could get a few more in the log. On 40m cw I worked about 6 stations and a couple on 20m cw then went back to 40m ssb to work John vk5bje at really strong signals but by then my page was full and I ended up with more than I thought I would get when I first started out.

So thanks to all the chasers and 5 S2S qso’s so plenty to add to my  log.

I walked up from down on the plain last year about 6 kilometres but today I walked only about 1 and my knee lives to go again tomorrow.

View to the south with Mount Remarkable in the back ground, The Battery summit is there also .

Another one done so off back to the ute and on to Quorn to the Quondong Café for the best Lemon Meringue pie in South Australia.

cheers see you on the next one

Ian vk5cz..