Activating a new park is always fun. When that happens to occur on a very relaxed weekend camping trip with your spouse? Even better!
The Duality of KC8JC is simple: I love state parks. I hate camping in them.
Why is that? Most of the time, state parks drop the sites on top of one another. In the post-COVID times, people have been markedly less courteous in the park campgrounds and it makes me edgy. That’s not why I go camping. I go to get away. That’s why we got the camper we got. It can go anywhere our tow vehicle can and we’ve proven that. I much prefer the remote national forests of Michigan’s upper peninsula. But that’s not less than an hour away.
My preferences and prejudices aside, this was a great weekend and the campground was stellar. The sites were secluded enough and everyone we ran into was great. Given that we decided on rather short notice to get out and have a weekend to relax, this was perfect. Just my wife, the dog, and me.
Yes, this was Bella The Radio Rottie’s first camping trip without our dearly beloved and departed Nacho. She seemed a bit on edge, but also glad to be out and about in the camper where she gets to sleep next to us at night. I did miss my beagle curled up in a ball next to me, so I get it.
Punderson has a lot going for it. I know we’ll go back there when the snow flies as they open the trails to fat bikes in the winter. I’m excited to see how that goes! But there’s no snow in August (in Ohio in 2026) so that’ll wait.
We didn’t get there in time for me to get an activation in before the 00:00z turned, so instead I got things set up at a leisurely place and we cooked up some dinner.
The Gear
This time out, I only took along the TR-45L (with the TR-35 in reserve Just In Case™). I didn’t really feel like messing around with digital modes and when I take the IC-705 I instinctively toss my computer in as well. I also didn’t want to work voice as I don’t like to be That Guy chattering away at the campground and I didn’t know what the scenario would be for operating elsewhere. The TR-45L makes a lot of decisions for me. It says that I’m going to be 5 watts (or less) and I’m going to run CW on 80m, 40m, 30m, 20m, or 17m. We all need that kind of simplicity sometimes.
I generally use the Chameleon whip with extension and ground spike when we camp. It’s much more reliable and less of a pain than putting a wire in a tree. There’s also a lot less to trip over and I don’t feel the need to hang a bunch of little flappy pieces of tape or anything to keep myself from walking into stuff. I can put up the whip, run a feedline into the camper, and toss out some radials. Done.
As for logging? Paper. Paper all day long.
Slowing Down
Operating with the TR-45L changes my entire demeanor. The knobs and switches and that delightful meter puts things in a different time. There are no magical filter settings. There’s just a notch filter and RF gain. No ATU, just a Z-match on the back. Match the line and start tapping. Sure, it does have two memories that make calling CQ for hours easier, but that’s really the end of the list for “Modern Features”. This is a no-nonsense radio and it demands a different approach. At least it feels like it does.
A radio without a waterfall invites me to stare out the window as I call CQ. I also feel like I listen more carefully when there isn’t a screen. Not that I’m giving up the IC-705 anytime soon, but the tempo is different. Maybe this is one of those things that is personal rather than universal. It really is nice to sit and pound out CQ and then wait for the contacts to come in.
And there was a lot of waiting.
The bands during the day were, as I like to say, Hot Garbage®. Noisy. Lots of crashing. It was also a really nice day and late August so I have to think that there were fewer hunters than normal. A quick peek at POTA.app showed that there was certainly not a huge number of activators out and about. There was no hurry. No place to be. More Morse. More tapping. Less stress.
The Activation
I pulled in 10 contacts and called it even. It was a long time tapping to get those 10. I did a fair bit of hunting too. I figured I’d try again after the UTC day rolled over - and I did. That round, when it was darker and 40m wasn’t as noisy, moved a lot faster. But even that was 11 and out. Sometimes, that’s just how it is. And that’s fine by me. I’m sure if I’d had a digital rig, I could have pulled in FT8 all night. But that didn’t fit the mood of the trip. In fact, it doesn’t fit my general POTA mood these days. Ya know what? That’s fine. It’s a hobby.
Speaking of hobby, I still get tickled when I see my silly web widget show me as On The Air.
QSO Map
The maps are just about what I would have expected. I did fairly well on my sub-5-watt setup.
Final
It was a nice, quick trip down the road to play radio and enjoy the camper. I’ll definitely head back to that park and I still can’t believe that I’ve never been. Ah well, it pays to play like a tourist in your hometown.
Thanks for reading and 73!