SOTA European Tour 2019 Day 9

Our final day of the tour, back into Belgium and the route home.

We had planed two summits for the last day but added this one as it was on the way.

ON/ON-004, Bois de Hazeille. (6 point summit 586 M).

Latitude: 50.0328, Longitude: 5.4267

This summit is right by an old disused air field, the small forest around the air strip is out of bounds as instructed by ON7DQ (Luc), so we operated on the track.

The route from Luxembourg took us through Bastogne and as this year is the 75th Anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge there were plenty of sights to look at.

After a short stop in Bastogne we headed to the summit. The turning near the monastery is at 50.024921, 5.406010 from here just follow the track until the T junction and turn left and follow this until you are near the second tower. All directions from Luc and they worked really well thank you.

I set up my dipole spotted myself and started on 20M, only two QSO's so I tried my luck on 40M and managed a further 11 QSO's, including two S2S's with DL/G1INK/P (Steve) on DM/BW-321 & GW4TQE/P (John) on GW/NW-054. my last was the legend himself ON7DQ (Luc).

On we move to summit two of the last day.

ON/ON-006, La Croix Scaille. (6 point summit 503 M).

Latitude: 49.9511, Longitude: 4.8447

This summit is only 100 M from the French boarder, the weather was fantastic, temperature was around 35 degree's and not too many visitors at the very large unusual tower. We decided to set up on the car park as there was only one other car there.

We decided to have lunch before I started calling CQ, a few nice fresh rolls and cup of coffee. It was a great pick nick hi hi.
I was ready to start calling CQ now so I decided to try 40M again as it was the best band on my last summit. I managed 8 QSO's including two S2S's again, this time OK2PDT/P (Jan) on OK/JC-010 & G4ZAO/P (David) on G/TW-001 on CW.
After just over 30 minutes we decided to call it an end and head towards our last summit.

Last summit of the Tour.
ON/ON-021, Plantis de Mesnil. (2 point summit 306 M).
Latitude: 50.1783, Longitude: 4.9148

This summit was about a 40 minute drive from our last summit and the time went by very fast. The air con was on full as I think it was 38 degrees outside. We parked up just in the small forest about 10 meters from the road side.

Just a short 5 minute walk into the woods and there is a small wooden shelter, we set up on the track just outside this. Again I opted for 40M, I just had a quick check on SOTAWatch3 and saw that DL/G1INK/P (Steve) was on DM/BW-256. I gave him a call and managed my first S2S with him from this location. I also had a S2S with DL3SBA/P (Lutz) who I had met on our first summit near Friedrichshafen. This followed with a S2S with SV2RUJ/P (Stavros) on SV/TL-002 and my final QSO of the tour was yet another S2S with DL/G1INK/P (Steve) again who had  managed to get to his second summit.
This was the end and Michelle asked if there were any more summits near that we could do Hi Hi I think she is hooked.

A big thank you to all of my chasers for making this Tour a great successes. I hope to do this again next year.

SOTA European Tour 2019 Day 8

Our first visit to Luxembourg for over 29 years, we last visited back in 1990 during my time serving in the British Army.

LX/LX-002, Grengenwald. (4 point summit 432 M).

Latitude: 49.6752, Longitude: 6.2027 

I had offered Michelle a day off from SOTA so we could spend the day in the city of Luxembourg itself. We had left our hotel in Germany at around 9 a.m. and started our journey North West. The SatNav had took us through France and we ended up paying around 30 euros in tolls (be warned).

We stayed in Luxembourg for just over an hour and then Michelle said shall we go back to the summits? I said are you sure and she said yes I am tired of shopping already hi hi I was very glad.
We parked at 49.670817, 6.206297 as suggested by ON7DQ (Luc) on his blog. I missed it the first time as it is very small so I had to turn around drive past it and turn around again as Luc said your cant turn left into this place.

The walk from the car to the activation zone took us about 15 minutes slow walking due to the temperature. I set up my dipole on 40 M, spotted myself and started calling. I managed 10 QSO's including a S2S with HB9BIN/P (Juerg) on HB/NW-011. We only stayed about 15 minutes as it was very hot.

Our second summit was very close to the hotel that we had booked into for the night so had decided to activate this one before we went to the hotel.

LX/LX-001 Steekammchen. (4 point summit 456 M).
Latitude: 49.9725, Longitude: 5.9517

We left the village of Erpeldange and headed south up the track towards the summit and saw a local farmer with his tractor and asked if it was ok to drive up to the summit and he said yes it was fine.

The tracks are fine to drive on and we arrived within 10 minutes.We found a hard standing to park up and walked 100 meters or so up to the AZ. I managed 11 QSO's including 5 on CW all on 40M. We stayed just over 30 minutes then packed up a headed to our hotel which was in Wiltz so only 10 minutes or so driving from the summit.

SOTA European Tour 2019 Day 7

Today's activation's were going to be our last in Germany, then we would be heading towards Luxembourg. These summits are close to the German - France boarder.

Our first summit was:

DM/BW-054, Hohloh. (10 point summit 984 M).

Latitude: 48.7086, Longitude: 8.4158

We parked at 48.713685,8.42438, this is a large drive around triangle shaped car park with lots of room for well over 200 cars. There were 3 cars including ours, so not too many people walking the summit. The weather was very hot so minimum gear, hats and lots of water to take as the walk is about 30 minutes with a slight to moderately steep incline.

During our little tour we saw a lot of the sign above. Umleitung German for diversion and they mean it, the German's block the road and you can take 20 - 30 minutes diversions which we had to on a few occasions.
This summit was a nice walk even in the hot sun, the main problem I had was no mobile phone signal on either my O2 or Michelle's EE network. I managed to get a S2S with S50AAA/P the Slovenia SOTA Club. I managed to save the day when I called break on the WAB Worked All Britain net on 40M. M0NMI (David) heard me calling and I managed two more QSO's. (Thank you WAB).

Our second summit of the day was going to be a highlight for me as I was going to be the 23rd only activation.

DM/BW-103, Merkur. (6 point summit 668 M).
Latitude: 48.7644, Longitude: 8.2806

The only way to this summit as far as I could see was via the cable railway, this was a carriage type system that held up to 16 passenger's in each car there was one at the top of the hill and one at the bottom.

We had a little walk around to admire the views then I set up my dipole, I started on 40m and my first QSO was with G4OBK (Phil) followed by a further 10 QSO's. I have now added up all of the chasers that followed me during the tour and the top place was joint with G4OBK (Phil) and G4WSB (Bill) both on 12 summits chased. Thank you guys, followed closely by EA2DT (Manuel) with 11 summits chased.

Time for our final German summit.

DM/BW-019, Hornisgrinde. (10 point summit 1163 M).
Latitude: 48.6058, Longitude: 8.2014

This was another drive on summit, as long as the barrier at the bottom is open so I was told when I asked at the shop at the bottom.
We parked up in the car park and walked around 100 M to the bench that I chose as the activation point. I quickly set up the dipole and managed 9 QSO's between 40M & 20M including a S2S with EA2BD/P (Ignacio) on EA2/NV-138.

After just a little over 25 minutes of operating we decided to call it a day as it was almost 18:30 p.m. local time and we still had to drive to our hotel for our last night in Germany and we had both decided on a German Gyros for food as we had not had one on this trip at all.

It went down very nicely followed by a glass of orange Fanta. It had been at least a year since our last one.

We stayed in a holiday inn for our last hotel near Ringsheim and it was probably the best nights sleep we had had.

SOTA European Tour 2019 Day 6

Today was Monday June 24th and time to leave the nice hotel we had stayed in for the last 4 nights and start our slow journey back towards Calais. We still had four days of SOTA left to activate so not the end by far.

Our first summit of the day was:
 DM/BW-853 Blankenhalde. (10 point summit 871 M).
Latitude: 48.0417, Longitude: 8.9954

The journey to this summit from our last hotel was amazing, the country side around this area is breath taking. We stopped many times to admire the scenery and take photo's of the area. As we arrived at the summit it was occupied by DL/HB9DBM/P (Mark) and his XYL. We had a quick chat and he said we had just missed ON7DQ (Luc) who had finished his activation 20 minutes earlier.
We moved onto the other side of the road and a little closer to the trig point and set up.

As I was getting my gear from the back of the car I heard Michelle scream? "what is wrong" I shouted as I ran to her. She had been shocked by a fully grown female deer that had jumped out of the woods only a few feet away from her, then ran away probably from Michelle's scream hi hi
 (poor deer).

I only managed 4 QSO's on this summit but it was qualified and that's what counts. As we had two more summits and a lot of driving today we packed up and set off to our next summit.



Second summit of the day.

DM/BW-195 Zundelberg. (10 point summit 954 M).

Latitude: 48.0547, Longitude: 8.7417

Our next summit was a 20 minute walk from the car park location of  48 052153, 8 733299 Michelle said its too warm and she stayed in the car. I should have driven further up towards the summit as the roads/tracks are not too bad. It was very hot as the temperatures were close to 35 Deg's. I took plenty of water with me and I need it.

I had to look at my map quite a few times to make sure I was on the correct track. I managed to get as close as I could to the summit and then set up my linked dipole and decided on 40M. My second QSO  was a S2S with S57MS/P (Marko) on S5/KS-025. I had 9 QSO's in all and then decided to pack up and make my way back to Michelle as by the time I got back had been alone for just over an hour. She was happy just sitting on a deck chair knitting.

On to our last summit of the day:
DM/BW-156 Lindenberg. (10 point summit 949 M).
Latitude: 47.9922, Longitude: 8.67

This is another drive on summit just north of the village of Ippingen, we drove up the forestry tracks and did take a wrong turning as Michelle's map reading needs to improve.
We parked in the woods and decided to operate just on the edge of the fields.

Michelle had finished her second knitted jacket she had been working on so she was very happy. I set up the linked dipole and had seen there was a S2S to have with LB4FH/P (Bob) on LA/MR-155 so I went straight to 14.285 Mhz and there he was, a S2S logged so I decided to stay on 20M for a short while and managed 3 more QSO's. Then I tried my luck on 40 M and managed another 16 QSO's including two more S2S's with DL/HB9DBM/P (Mark) on DM/BW-361 whom we had met earlier on in the day and F5LKW/P (Roger) on F/CR-142.