Author: Jack

You would think that with a name like “Mingus”, it wouldn’t really be necessary to specify the SOTA designator — but you would be wrong, as there is also a Mount Mingus (W4T/SU-008) in the database. I’d assert that my Mingus is the One True Mingus. I don’t know if there is any technical difference whether something is named Mountain versus Mount, but I would like to think there is, and that the one I climbed was the real deal: my first ten-point summit. We just don’t have mountains like this in the Mid-Atlantic region.

I had initially missed Mount Mingus because of a peculiarity of the Arizona association’s database. Initially, the state was divided into two regions, east and west. Mingus is in the west part. Later, they when more states were added, additional regions with tighter geographic scope were created like North and South Maricopa around Phoenix. I had wondered why some mountains appeared to be missing in the regional databases. Now I know.

Continue reading “SOTA W7A/WA-010: Mingus Mountain”

Getting to the top of Mount Suappoa wasn’t too bad, since it’s mostly a matter of following a paved road. For the same two activator points, Goat Hill was much more of a climb. As mentioned, both peaks are in South Mountain Park to the South of Phoenix. In fact, in the picture at right, you can see antennas on Suappoa.

The aptly named Summit Road winds through the park and cuts across Ranger Trail which leads up to Goat Hill. It looks like Ranger Trail is used by both hikers and those on horses, and that some begin lower down on the trail.

Continue reading “SOTA: W7A/MS-065 Goat Hill”

Since I was only in Arizona for a short time on this trip, I didn’t attempt to acclimate to the local time zone, I just let me biological clock freewheel. The night before this outing, I had gone to bed at 6:30 in the evening, which seemed just fine to me. The flip side of this was then waking up around 3 am. Instead of forcing myself back to sleep, I just started my day. I got some work email out of the way and then began looking through peak information. I found two peaks that had been previously activated, seemed like reasonable climbs, and which were near each other, both in South Mountain Park.

Continue reading “SOTA W7A/MS-048 Mount Suappoa”

I have a few more SOTA adventures to report, the most recent from a brief trip to Arizona. During that trip I visited three peaks, but I wanted first to write about Lookout Mountain, W7A/MS-050. I had reviewed summits on the SOTA database before the trip and thought that this peak was a good candidate, particularly since it has never been activated.

When I flew into Phoneix it was early in the day — too early to check in, so I pointed the rental car towards the mountain. I took 16th Street south of East Greenway up to a parking lot at the base of the mountain; this is the start of Trailhead #308. There is a sign there with some topographic maps and information about environmental hazards.

Continue reading “SOTA W7A/MS-050: The road not taken”

After a week of meetings in Washington, I arrived in San Francisco for a meeting on gastrointestinal cancer that is held every year about this time.  In the previous week, I had thought about where I might operate if weather were good and decided on Mount Davidson, the highest elevation within the City of San Francisco, and a SOTA peak (W6/NC-423). I got into town the day before meetings and the forecast was good, so took a bus to the park entrance. For reference, the bus stop is at the intersections of Dalewood Way and Lansdale Avenue. I have to admit that the bus did a lot of the work, as the park entrance itself it at considerable elevation. From that entrance, there is a clear trail right up to the summit. The trail was in good shape, but a bit slippery since it had rained the day before.

There is a sign near the base of the trail that specifies that the very top of the mountain is not owned by the city, but owned privately (but nonetheless is accessible by the public). I worked from a park bench in that area, throwing my end-fedz antenna over a eucalyptus tree just to the west of the bench.

I went in the afternoon, which I thought would give me the best chance of reaching the US East Coast on 20m and perhaps working regionally on 40m. It was a week day and propagation was a little down, and I ended up with about fifteen contacts, which ranged from K6EL’s booming signal from a neighboring hill out to New York. Again, contacts spread evenly between 40m and 20m, with only K6EL hearing my call on 10m. I had meant to try 2m, but left the antenna in the hotel room.

I came down the mountain when it got dark, and while it was a fun adventure to take the bus to the mountain, I dialed up an Uber car when I got to the trail head and was back in the city 20 minutes later. The QSOs have been logged into the SOTA database, but upload to LOTW will again have to await my return to Antananarivo next week.

Here’s a picture from the peak facing North. I like this picture, because I can see my operating positions from previous visits to San Francisco: Buena Vista Park and Twin Peaks.

 

I thought I would be lucky if I had time to activate one summit on my visit to San Francisco, but morning meetings left my afternoons free, so I activated Mt Davidson (NC-423) as planned but also worked in Richardson East Benchmark (NC-407). Yesterday, thanks to a monstrous amount of snow that shut down airports on the US east coast, I found myself with an extra day in San Francisco. After reviewing maps, reports from other activators and a quick look at weather, I chose to visit NC-432, Chabot 2 Benchmark (what does that mean, benchmark? Why are all these peaks called Benchmark? Is that a west coast thing?).

One of my main criteria for choosing this peak, like the others I visited on this trip, was that it would be accessible by public transportation: I took the BART underground from near my hotel (Powell Station), green line towards Daly City, stopping at Bay Fair. From the bus terminal at that station, I caught the 89 “counter-clockwise”. The bus runs only hourly on the weekends, so I had a bit of a wait. I took the bus to the Juvenile Justice Center, about ten minutes away. I suppose you could walk, but the route crosses a major interstate (580) and there’s more walking to come, so I thought it was worth the $2.10 fare.

Continue reading “SOTA W6/NC-432 (Chabot 2 Benchmark)”

Having worked Mount Davidson, the highest point in San Francisco (283m), the only way to get more altitude (“excelsior!”) was to leave the city. I set my sights on Richardson East Benchmark (339m) in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, just north across the Golden Gate bridge from the city.

After spending the morning in meetings, I again checked the weather forecast. Although it had been drizzling all morning, the lowest probability of precipitation occurred in the afternoon, so I packed my bags and took the 70 bus north from 5th and Mission. The timing worked out just right, by the time the bus got to the destination, rain had stopped.

The most convenient entrance to the park is at the park and ride station, “Spencer Avenue Bus Pad”.  Google Maps suggested taking one of the North bound buses, e.g, the 70 or the 4, northward past the stop and then coming back southward on another bus since the trail head is on the southbound side of the bus pad. This is not necessary, as you can walk from one side of the bus pad to the other through an underpass. This shaves off a lot of time and some extra bus fare.

There is a sign near the entrance, the morning sun trail. Stairs lead upward from that point, and the morning sun trail joins with other trails that circle the peak. The stairs wind back and forth a bit, but are not too steep. I did find the upper portion of the stairs slippery since it had rained earlier in the day and the stairs were covered with organic detritus (i.e., dead leaves).

At the top of the stairs, there is a scenic lookout, which includes a bench. The peak itself is visible from there, topped with commercial radio antennas. I ended up climbing most of the way up, but wanted to keep some distance to those antennas. Again, my antenna plan consisted of throwing the 10/20/40 end-feds into a tree.

I did remember this time to bring the VHF antenna and I tried putting out a call on the 2m calling frequency at the start and end of operation, but heard nothing. My business band was 20 meters, with 35 contacts. I was working two a minute for a while. I only had two contacts on 40m, which seemed alive with activity, but mostly QRO, so I might have been buried in the noise.

Some of the activity might be attributable to a comment that NF1R added on sota spotting network, that the peak was not only a SOTA peak, but also NPOTA RC11. I hadn’t realized that when I chose the location, but when I enter the contacts into LOTW, I’ll be sure to use the NPOTA unit number so chasers get NPOTA credit as well. The SOTA contacts have already been entered, but I’ll need to get home to update LOTW.

Best DX to the east was NY (preparing for a blizzard), FL and TX to the south, a good showing for Canadian stations (ON, QC, and BC), and westward, HI.