Well just another four hours of driving till we get home. Well I am riding now but will drive the last stretch through Iowa. By the time we get home we will have been on the road for about 22.5 hours.
Any way I just did the tally and I have 238 contacts in the log from 25 different grids and from 6 different states. A few of the high lights of the trips as far as sat ops go was working vo52 from two grids while mobile. For the First three minutes of the pass I was in dn91 then passed into dn90 and worked three station from each grid. Also at the last minute I decided to take and hour detour north off of i80 to the en01/00 gridline just north of grand island to work quite a few stations. And to all those who worked me on fo29 while I was mobile I am sorry for the weak signals. My half wave mobile whip got damaged early trip by a big bird at 80mph and it never worked right after that. For a while it didn't work at all but with some roadside repairs i got it working to get us through the trip. Also if you working me you might have noticed sometimes I signed mobile and sometimes I signed portable. Well this was for a reason that is quite obvious. When I signed my I was using my ft857 with halfwave mobile antenna for 2m and three el arrow for 70cm. Mostly was semi duplex while mobile but sometimes used the ft817 for rx. When I signed portable I was using the ft897/817 pair with an arrow antenna which performed flawlessly. Well all but my battery charger for the ft897 batteries stopped working which wasn't an issue because I had a back up 35amphr gelcel along. Charged everything while driving through inverter and once in the hotel room. If you want qsls for grids which I assume some will of you could send a sase with the contacts you want with the grid I was In writen on the card that would be good. It might take a little bit for cards to get back out as I might need to get some made. But it shouldn't take more then a month or two. Thanks to all who followed me along the trip! 73 Wyatt AC0RA _______________________________________________ Sent via AMSAT-BB@amsat.org. Opinions expressed are those of the author. Not an AMSAT-NA member? Join now to support the amateur satellite program! Subscription settings: http://amsat.org/mailman/listinfo/amsat-bb
