QRP in the Driftless

Author: Admim

  • Sandwich Hamfest, and the answer to a question

    Going to Sandwich is a brief but major upheaval in life: go to bed early, get up at midnight and drive until dawn. Shop till ya drop. Drive home. (to read about this process in detail, see last years post) Does that make it sound awful? It’s really a lot of fun. People I only…

  • A quick visit to Buckhorn SWA, US-12077

    I was up early today, with a choice: hike, or play radio? Radio won today, and I headed for Buckhorn SWA. We had thunderstorms last night and it was still windy and overcast. I imagine that the trails would be muddy and slippery. I remembered to bring along a long tape measure, so while setting…

  • Spring in the Kickapoo Valley, at US-4296

    In the morning I wasn’t even thinking about radio, but with an early start on the household stuff, as noon approached the vista of the afternoon opened before me. I mulled over the POTA map for a few minutes and for some reason Kickapoo Valley SWA seemed like a good idea. Looking back, I see…

  • Buckhorn SWA again

    April Fools Day, (Election Day in Wisconsin), though chilly, overcast, and windy, nevertheless provided a few unallocated hours for an afternoon activation, and I chose Buckhorn State Wildlife Area as my site. As a relatively new entity it has only been activated 4 times, 5 if you count this one; the leaderboard hasn’t even fully…

  • Simpson 260

    This was the standard of the industry in the pre-digital era: Durable, accurate, electrically rugged, utterly dependable; what’s not to love? Analog volt-ohm-milliammeters are still useful for all sorts of tasks, some of which (like finding intermittents in wire and cables) are not easily done with a DMM. I really should have taken a picture…

  • A double activation at Buckhorn

    It seemed a little weird, is all; the last two times I went to activate Buckhorn State Park something interfered and no activating happened. Yesterday I decided to invoke the “third time lucky” clause and went back. The day started out lightly overcast and a bit below freezing, but the sun broke through early and…

  • Antenna repair

    Yesterday in the late afternoon I went up to Buckhorn State Park to try an activation. When I started to set up the antenna I saw this: When I pulled the top section all the way out followed by the second section it came apart in my hand. Field repairs will be necessary! I’m guessing…

  • A springlike afternoon at Wildcat Mountain

    Even though it was late in the day, it was just too nice a day to let the opportunity to play radio slip away! I thought a lot about where to go: new park? different park? but in the end, I went with nearby and familiar. Other than that, everything went well! The X6100 was…

  • A hike in the Kickapoo Valley Reserve

    It rained all last night, and the rain changed to snow about an hour ago; a perfect time to sit by the bay window and remember the stretch of unusually warm weather a few days ago … Monday started off kind of cold but the overcast quickly burned off and the temperature kept rising; by…

  • First hamfest of the year

    It was scheduled to be in the Legion hall in Onalaska (suburb of LaCrosse), but due to inadvertent double booking it was moved to the Legion hall in Sparta at the last minute. The reason I know this is the club secretary, who was in the parking lot in Onalaska to redirect strays (such as…

  • a Western Electric 6B key question

    If you know the answer, please tell me in the comments. Thanks for visiting driftlessqrp!

  • Spring(ish) at Buckhorn State Park

    I don’t suppose that it’s surprising that Wisconsin should have a couple of weeks of deep-freeze weather in the middle of February; just inconvenient. Yesterday was warmish, the forecast predicted more and better for today; it might be Radio Weather! A few minutes before 7 I was at the local Kwik Trip filling up multiple…