After the 6 summit marathon out of Benbleby Ranges Hugh and I did a day trip to Yunta for 3 summits.

Because there was road works on The Barrier Highway, Hugh found a way via mostly dirt roads to Peterborough from his home to try to save hold ups at the work sites. Once out of Peterborough we headed for Dawson then a back way into Nackara Hill which turned into some back tracking to find a way. When we got to the western end of the old road we normally take from the Eastern side we found a brand new fence across the roadway and no gate near by. We had to drive North towards Yunta then take another station track to get to the Summit. Being about 40 minutes late we were lucky enough to have a small group on 80m waiting for us after their normal morning Sked. Hugh and I went tag team on 80m SSB then got off the summit and headed to Yunta still another 90km away. On the way to Teetulpa Station we usually go to Waroonee Hill first it saves time getting there and we need to drive about 12 km of station tracks to the parking spot. Un eventful hike up probably the greenest we have seen it for a few years, we got on 80m SSB to find some chasers waiting then Hugh topped up his score on 40m SSB and I worked a few more on 40m CW.

The poor old land scape is still not recovered from years of drought but it’s better than we have seen it for a while. Hugh and I got off the hill and then had to travel about 35 km to the next summit north of the homestead. Karkala Ridge is a 1.2 km hike up from the parking spot which is not a hard slog but quite rocky under foot.

The wind was very strong on this afternoon summit so we only put the Squid pole up 6 metres and leaned it into the wind to keep it up. The bush we used to tie to is broken down by hungry goats so is no longer a viable support therefor we bungeed the pole around the rock shelf and packed extra rocks for support. No shortage of rocks up here.

Nice afternoon activation with plenty of chasers then the long drive back to Clare through lots of road works to make the journey even slower. Just an easy 600 odd kilometre day out on SOTA.

Hawker Summits.

Some time later I have been researching access to more Summits around Hawker probably inspired by our visit to Mt Arden where you can see all the summits near Hawker, I made it my business to find out land owners contact details in that area. Of course its never easy but Mr Google did shed some light for me, I did a search on the Pastoral lease name and sure enough they had won some prizes in a Ram show with their prize Merino Rams a few years ago. Another search for the family name in the White Pages gave me a phone number. I ring this number some what nervous to the reaction at the other end of course, a total stranger calling on the phone to ask access to his hill so I can talk on the radio. It takes a bit of work explaining what this is all about assuming he has not hung up the phone by now. I would say in my case this is the hardest part of SOTA, asking and working with land owners for access to their properties, the hikes up are tough in some cases but this is harder than that I think. Up shot was the Summit I was talking about turns out not to be on his land but another fella owns it. OK well what about this other hill over here, that one was on his property and another hill over the other side of the road is too. It’s getting better all the time up until the let down of course, He wants more information about what I want to do and do I have public risk insurance and so on . He was a bit astounded why anyone would want to hike up his hill and talk on a radio and I was slowly giving up altogether when he said to call around one day and show him my gear and how I plan to go about it. So an appointment booked in advance sometime next year in winter should be good enough fingers crossed to grant access then. We ended up friends I think, time will tell. The good part about getting access to more summits around Hawker makes it more worth while to go and stay there for a couple days to do them all, at the moment I have only two summits on my list and a possible 6 others if permission could be sorted. That means money spent in Hawker for Food, Fuel and Accommodation and the land owner gets free premium wine from the beautiful Clare Valley. Sorry I diverge.

Turns out west of Hawker town is a summit that permission is already granted to bush walkers so I made an evening visit just to find the activation zone ready for the next day.

Yourambulla Range Summit was my first time to activate there so exciting day for me first new summit in many years.

A great well marked hike not that hard just a couple rock scrambles and I saw 1 Yellow Footed Rock Wallaby pretty rare around these parts no picture he scampered off well before I had a camera ready.

I got to the summit just before UTC roll over and was able to hand out two lots of chaser points for this summit as it is only a 1 point summit helps double the chasers score. I did not make any QSO on 40m SSB which surprised me but I had a large pile up on 40m CW so that was good.

I finished up in good time on Yourumbulla Range and headed for Hawker to refuel then out East to Worumba Station to visit Mt Plantagenet one of the 8 point summits I visit but its a drive up. After a nice chat with Mary I headed for the summit being by myself I had to open and shut several gate to get there. This summit has a well made track to the top it is possible to drive up in high range 4×4 as the road is in very good order these days.

I had a good amount of QSO’s once set up and the weather was really nice not much wind and very sunny.

A large group on 80m although the band was not so good this time during middle of the day but I worked everyone who heard me. Several callers on 40m SSB and even more on 40m CW turns out to be a great activation the only thing now in to get off the hill deal with the gates and head for home.

Black Rock Peak and Stokes Hill

Another day trip to a couple summits around Orroroo this time a bit closer in but still a 460 km trip.

We left Hugh’s place right on 6am and hit the usual dirt roads north taking a new way from Peterborough this time to reach Black Rock peak probably an hour before Alert time. That’s OK good to be in front for a change. This summit is a 4×4 up to near the top, we went about half a kilometre further on the track this time to a new closer park spot from the Activation Zone.

Because we were early a quick TxT msg to VK5IS who got on 2m to a few local stations we were away getting a score tag team on 80m SSB then Hugh did the 40m SSB chasers and I handed out some 40m CW before roll over then again after roll over as well and a few ZL ops on 20m CW.

Hugh had a good score on 40m SSB even making it to ZL.

I made several CW contacts on 40m after Tag team on 80m SSB with Hugh several regulars were not on 80m but still found 4 QSO’s on 80m.

After UTC roll over I got several more stations giving me a total of 15 contacts for the Activation.

On the way to Stoke Hill which is about 65 km away we dropped some wine off to our farmers then hit the dirt tracks again to make Stokes Hill in good time. We had a lunch break there and I let some air out of my tyres to tackle the steep rocky accent of Stoke’s Hill. It takes about 40 minutes in low range 1st and 2nd gear on this track, Hugh had to clean a few fallen logs and some diff banger rocks out of the way but all went well on the climb.

The Chair and table were still in the back of my Ute from a recent VKFF parks visit so we set up in style this time.

Only 3 stations on 80m but we did work some local VK5’s on 40m SSB and CW with really strong signals good to have some short skip for a change.

Nice group of chasers on 40m CW a S2S with VK3ARR on VK3/VS-048 and a new chaser on 40m CW VK2LI first time caller for me. Got 2 extra ZL stations on 20m CW as well.

Great weather again hardly any wind and Spring in well on the way up there, another good rain soon would be good.

Slowly ever so Slowly back off the Mountain on the down track taking about 30 minutes to get back to the roads and head for home.

Managed a QSO with VK5AMC/ tractor mobile via VK5RLH 2m repeater at Lochiel 167 km away from my Ute rig on 50 watts.

Thanks to the Chasers and Land Owners for another lot of SOTA fun.

Thanks for reading my Blog.

Regards Ian vk5cz ..