Scanning the Airwaves

Carl and Jim and the line for tickets Back in May, I went to my first Hamvention, the largest ham radio convention in the world, held in Xenia, Ohio. I was originally planning on going in 2020 with Jim, KB1KQW, as we were discussing at that year's Boston Marathon training but then COVID happened. I flew out of Boston Logan on May 19th with Jim to Columbus, Ohio, where we met up with former Massachusetts native Carl, N1FY, who had settled down there after traveling the world until COVID struck.  From there, we drove to Dayton and checked into a Doubletree hotel in Miamisburg, Ohio. Then the next day it was off to Hamvention! There I was inducted into SLARC among other things, met some new people and came across those I knew. I also got to tour DARA's clubhouse! All in all, a good time. We left on Sunday and drove back to Columbus, spent the night at Carl's and flew back home the next morning. I will definitely be going back next year!

Sorry, for the delayed post, just been busy with work. It's back! The Marathon is back! At last, we had a Marathon on Patriots' Day again! Although, COVID is by no means gone, it felt good to be back to somewhat normal. Speaking of COVID, this year all Marathon volunteers had to be vaccinated. Anyways, this year I once again provided communications for a medical tent. In fact, the same medical tent as last year although with a different team, well actually, more like the some of the same team as I had in 2019. This year was mostly uneventful, and I had a competent ham partner this time around. The last two times left something to be desired. All in all, a good time was had.

Yours truly participating in Winter Field Day. (Photo: N3JEC)  I've participated in the ARRL's Field Day for the past couple of years, but never Winter Field Day until this past weekend. Held at Nockamixon State Park in rural Bucks County, Pennsylvania, this Winter Field Day operation was done under the aegis of the Young Amateurs Radio Club (YARC) of which I am a member, and was overseen by Charlie, K3NOP who coordinated the whole event.  I left Massachusetts Friday morning and after a 5 hour drive, arrived in the late afternoon at the park. I helped to set up antennas as soon as I arrived. While the even didn't start till 2pm EDT the next day, I got up at 2am after failing to fall asleep and was joined by N3JEC with our respective FT-991As and started playing radio early. W1PAC and N3JEC playing radio at 2am in the morning. The next day the contest got underway and we were off and running doing digital and voice as a 4 India station. At some points we had 3 operators at ...