RaDAR by Foot

I took advantage of a trip to Miramar Beach near Destin FL to visit the TopSail Hill Preserve State Park. When I arrived I did not know what it offered. The park is on the beach but has trails through the woods and has a couple of lakes. I took advantage of a trail and hiked 2.5 km with my gear to some picnic facilities with restrooms no less. Hey that is all I ask for portable ops. My backpack had everything I needed for this situation including KX3, battery Alexloop and accessories.

My first contact was Wink WA8KOQ in TN on 30 meters. Then I switched to 17 meters SSB which was open. My first QSO was N9IMS the Indy 500 special event station. This was followed by working KA1GJU Aeronautical Mobile. Kris was in a 737 headed west over New Orleans.  A fun QSO he actually said he would rather be in the park than the plane. This was the Made My Day QSO. Then I worked W7P a special station for Lake Powell/Grand Canyon. The final QSO was EA8/DK5AL at La Palma Island the most north-westerly of the Canary Islands, Africa. He was running 80 watts to a dipole.

This was an enjoyable outing and I got a 5 km walk in. This qualifies for the Pedestrian Mobile category multiplier in the RaDAR Program. The RADAR program is a good way to exercise your portable operating skills and equipment. See this link for the rules. In addition there is a Google+ Community: Rapidly Deployable Amateur Radio (RaDAR) for sharing your RaDAR operations at this link You don't have to join the community to participate in RaDAR. The RaDAR program is administered by Markus KD0JKM. The RaDAR rule structure is close to that formulated by the founder of the RaDAR contest idea: Eddie ZS6BNE.