Morning drive out this morning to meet Hugh again to finish off our weekend of SOTA around Orroroo one of my favourite places to stay . As you can see the grass this year is very high and extremely dried out now so we decided not to go to Black Rock for the afternoon activation. The temperature was rising all the time as we started to walk to Peaked Hill and was it 33 c by the time we got off that summit .

Peaked Hill is only a 2 point summit but a tough climb through the rocks near the top and it took about 45 minutes to walk in from the Ute. We found an old track which will take us further next time in the winter but it was hard to find and overgrown for this time of year.

This is about half way up looking back to the west at the Olladie Hills another summit we don’t have access too.

This is my view from the top looking at Black Rock and Depot Hill summits we had to let them go this year but hope to get to activate there next year in a better part of the season.

Great summit to activate but not a lot of room for the antennas, my 80m extention wires were almost running along the ground but we managed to make contacts.

My KX3 had a baby !! no not really its Hugh’s KX2 which I like very much, we just have to spend a bit more time with the hand book and sort out some SOTA frequencies in memory and learn a bit more about it’s functions.

I do like the larger internal speaker it is much better than the KX3 speaker which rattles around in the tin box if you are not careful on the AF control or a really loud station calls unexpectantly. So I am still raving about this KX2 rig, still like my KX3 and won’t be buying one just yet, but of course leaving my options open.

A sign from above I think its telling me it’s too hot today.

We only had 4 qso’s each on 80m and did not stay on the hill for long due to the rising temperature.

I had trouble with the internet on my phone as well it was losing the internet connection, I had to drive south of Orroroo on the way home before I could get access to cancel the afternoon activation.

Happy smiling red faced KX2 owner , we did get some sun burn on this trip.

This is my last trip up north until next year so time to concentrate on some other activity for a few months, I can feel withdrawals for SOTA already.

Thanks everyone for you interest in my blogs and I hope to be back soon.

Regards

Ian vk5cz ..