Saturday, August 10, 2019

2019-08-10 New Mexico & Arizona Double


I’ve been going a little crazy this week nursing my punctured leg wound and couldn’t wait to get back on the trail.  (I write about the injury trip HERE).  I worked on my summer villa all day yesterday hanging from a ladder.  My leg felt fine so I thought I would take advantage of my last day up here and do a little SOTA. 

I headed out early this morning into Luna, New Mexico for a “drive up” and then over to Springerville, Arizona for a short hike to a summit there (1 mi round trip).  I got on the road about 0630 local and I stopped in Alpine for breakfast at the Bear Wallow and then headed over to Luna, about 20 minutes away.  FS 35 was about 5 or 10 miles past Luna and it was an easy trip to the summit where there was an array of various RF repeaters and other gear.  The country here is heavily wooded, lush and greeen, much like Alpine.  Setup was fairly easy.  It’s overcast with low clouds and about 57 degrees F.  Just beautiful.
[click on image for larger]

It was early summit so there weren’t any other SOTA stations on the air.  The contacts came easy.  There isn’t a name for this peak (W5N/AP-024) but when looking at the USGS charts, it says “San Francisco Electronic Site”.  The peak is in the “San Francisco Mountains”.  It’s an odd designation for a particular mountain but accurate description.

It didn’t take me long to get over here so I thought I could hit one more easy summit over by Springerville, AZ, Coyote Hills (W7A/AP-037).  From where I park it’s exactly a half mile to the summit, an easy hike. My wound is healing well, and with a little Motrin, it feels fine. 

The last time I was on Coyote Hills, it was in the 80+ and a bit windy.  Today it’s about 70 and the clouds are moving in.  I had to abort this summit last week due to thunderstorms.  It looks like I’ll have at-least 2 hours to goof around before I’m chased off the mountain by thunderstorms this time  I’m looking forward to doing a little summit-to-summit chasing today.

Setup on the peak was straightforward (I’m watching my step today) but I’m uber disappointed when I find out that even though my AT&T iPhone has 4 bars and the 3G indicator lit, I have no data service....   I couldn’t get a spot out using my phone and could only pull a list of spots down once. Very odd.  After goofing around with it for a while I got out my Garmin Inreach Communicator and used it to post a spot.  I think Gary, W0MNA was number two today.  I had a few QSO’s with operators that wanted to talk for awhile.  I was happy to kick back in my chair and oblige them.  Once I worked my pileup down, I tried spotting myself on 40 meters but I got no contacts. 

Thunderstorms were moving in quickly from the east.  I talked to a ham in Tucson via a VHF linked repeater located south of Alpine at noon and he mentioned that it was raining hard in Tucson.  Looking at the storm and the fact that Tucson is getting hit, I’m guessing the monsoons are finally here...

I wasn't able to chase today but I did have a summit-to-summit from KB7CWV.  All in all it was a good day.  Beautiful drive, great weather, and my leg seems to be healing nicely. 

Special thanks to Andrew KD5ZZK for suggesting I try the NM summits.



Contacts

Own
Callsign
Date
Time
Summit
Band
Mode
Station
Worked
Notes
N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
15:04
W5N/AP-024
14MHz
SSB
KB9RPG

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
15:11
W5N/AP-024
14MHz
SSB
KJ4ZMV

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
15:12
W5N/AP-024
14MHz
SSB
N4EX

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
15:15
W5N/AP-024
14MHz
SSB
AB4PP

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
15:16
W5N/AP-024
14MHz
SSB
K1LIZ

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
15:16
W5N/AP-024
14MHz
SSB
KJ9X

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
15:16
W5N/AP-024
14MHz
SSB
KI4TN

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
15:17
W5N/AP-024
14MHz
SSB
N7DMO

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
17:46
W5N/AP-024
14MHz
SSB
AB0RJ

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
17:58
W5N/AP-024
14MHz
SSB
KG7KA

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:06
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
W0MNA

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:15
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
N4EX

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:15
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
KD0MQO

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:16
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
W0ERI

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:16
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
AG6PF

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:17
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
K6QCB

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:17
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
K3TCU

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:18
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
NK6A

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:19
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
WC6J

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:19
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
N7CNH

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:21
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
WA5PSV

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:22
W7A/AP-037
14MHz
SSB
AB4PP

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:23
W7A/AP-037
7MHz
SSB
KB7CWV
 Summit to Summit
N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:39
W7A/AP-037
7MHz
SSB
WA6KYR

N1CLC
10/Aug/2019
18:39
W7A/AP-037
7MHz
SSB
K6LDQ



Loadout for the multiple summits:
NOTE:  The links for these were broken, I've updated them on my equipment loadout page.
      Gregory Zulu 40 backpack
      First aid kit.  Make sure it’s a good one... like ability to patch up an impalement wound.        CHA MPAS with spike and additional MIL mast (and version 2 of the top section)
      Yaesu FT-891D HF Radio at 100 watts
   30’ of coax feed line
      Yaesu FT-2DR HT
      Slim Jim dual band antenna for my HT.
      3 L of water (8 lb)
      iPhone with All Trails, MotionX GPS and sota goat
      LDG Z-100 plus auto antenna tuner for the FT 891
      Trekking poles
      Jetboil MicroMo cooking system
     Packtenna.
   Extra LiFePO Battery
   AnyTone AT-868UV DMR radio for testing.
   Custom wiine bottle cork paddles for CW (crafted by K6ARK)
   American Morse Porta Paddle for CW
   Delorme Inreach satellite tracker and communicator.

73,
N1CLC
Christian Claborne
(aka Chris Claborne)



No comments:

Post a Comment