Activation of PAFF-0048, Ooypolder en Millingerwaard

 We were expecting a some nice weather this week with temperatures up to 10 degrees, so time to dust off my backpack and do a short WWFF activation. At 10:30 on the morning I took the train to the city of Nijmegen. From the train station it's a short walk to the river Waal and the activation zone, PAFF-0048. I found a nice spot close to the water with views to the bridge and the city in the distance. 

I had a good start on 40 meters with more than 20 contacts in the log in a short time. Then on to 30 and 20 meters. Propagation on 20 seemed very good, QSO's with 4Z4DX, AE1T en WK2S with only 5 Watts output. 48 QSO's in the log after one hour! My antenna was 14 meters of wire attached to a 7 meter Spiderbeam pole with 2 ground radials of 5 meter long.

 

The NTC QSO party from Spain, EA/PG4I

A few days before the QSO party we arrived in Llanes on the north coast of Spain. I brought along a small trusdx transceiver (QRP-5W), a palm mini paddle and a loaded vertical for 40 meters with 2 radials on a 12m Spiderbeam pole. 45 minutes before the QSO party I set up my station. Made a first QSO with SM/DL3JJ/P from near Stockholm and almost worked a OZ station but QSB was to strong. Then I did a quick CQ which showed RBN spots from PA, DL, F, G and CT. So things were looking good!

At 19:00 UTC the skies darkened and I needed to take a break because of the rain coming in. Then a first QSO at 19:08 with Dali OK2BVX, 559 reports. In the next 50 minutes I contacted 6 Dutch stations: Frank PA7F, Theo PA3HEN, Rene PA3GPX, Carel PA0CMU, Marcel PA3HEB and Wim PA0VAM. Also worked Andy DK9HE from France and Vanni I5ECW, being my last QSO. The QSOs with Marcel and Wim took a while to complete because of my weak signal. 9 contacts in total, I was surprised that it worked so well!