Still no contact but yet another long path day

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Well, that was fun.


It's a freezing cold morning so I had to go out before the sunrise. First I did some shopping and then drove to the nature reserve on top of the Chiltern hills. As the sun was rising off the horizon, I was ready with the radio setup, this time the MJ-945E, a single-band 20m antenna and the FT-818.

CQ baaa ! CQ baaaa! CQ baaaa!


Yet once more the Australia was wide open! Plenty of VK stations were on air, Tasmania stations were also coming loud and clear! It was almost impossible to find a clear frequency, the whole band was glowing. The Russians and Italians were out en-force, Spain was coming out loud and clear too. I could even hear local(ish) G and M stations via ground wave. 

In the end I spent over an hour basically listening and that was fun. I didn't have the power cable for the FT-818 so I couldn't transmit over a couple of watts, so no one responded back. QRP SSB is really a struggle. I must bring out the laptop for FT-8 work.

Around 10 I packed up and went back home, I needed some hot drinks by then. 

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