Intro For the past few years, our family has gone to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan for a week of camping and relaxing in some of the most beautiful places along Lake Superior. I'm a Great Lak...

Jamboree On The Air I'm an Eagle Scout. I was very, very into the program as a kid and both of my children are involved in Scouting. Since I got my amateur radio license, I've tried to help out...

What Are We Doing? This blog exists for me to catalog sucesses and failures. The other thing it does is provide me with a place to put things so that I can get to them no matter where I am assu...

On Being Invisible Late last week, I was made aware of some concerns that the POTA team were having relayed to them by various official agencies about the poor behavior of activators in parks a...

A short report this time as there isn't much to say about this one. My wife and I had a weekend to ourselves and we love to get out and ride. Our favorite destination is still Cuyahoga Valley Nat...

Some days, things end up in such a way as to allow us a little more space. On other days, we have to make that space. In either case, when it's time to take a minute, it's time. So it was on this...

As July comes to a close, we're starting to see the calendar ramp up for the back to school season in our house. That means that my phone is always covered in new things being added to the calend...

The last couple of weeks of July in NE Ohio are when everyone seems to empty out and head to a vacation destination. School will kick off for the kids earlier than usual this year, so everyone is...

The Warthog! I took a day off from work and having cleared some time off at home, found myself in the position to have the better part of a day to do a rove. I've been thinking about this for a...

There are as many ways to enjoy this hobby as there are people enjoying it. Plenty of categories for one to assign to one's self. There are contesters. There are DXers. There are experimenters an...

Last week was big for my family. My wife and daughter were at camp while my son and I held down the fort and fed the dogs. With the ladies home safe and sound, and knowing that it was Support You...

With all of the fun and adventure of our week plus in the U.P. I was afraid that it would be a bit of a downer coming back to the same old, same old. Happy to report that is not the case. After u...

The Plan This year, we decided to do a similar trip to what we did last year. We packed up the camper and headed to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan for some time close to Lake Superior. We had ...

It was a weeked of time spent outdoors. The sun was there, the breeze was good, and the weather held all through Saturday and most of Sunday. It is a glorious time to live in the part of the worl...

With it being Memorial Day weekend in the U.S. I decided to take Friday off. The weather in NE Ohio is only like this for a small slice of the year and given that it wasn’t raining or grey, it wa...

It was a Friday afternoon. I took half the day off to deal with a few things that were time sensitive. They were taken care of well ahead of when I thought they would be, so I found something to ...

Monday evenings around our house are usually busy. My family has a standing activity and I use that time to get things done or sometimes to read in the quiet for a moment. Last night, however, I ...

Making My Own Problems On an average spring to fall weekend in NE Ohio what I want to do is get on my bike, ride to the park, and get on the air. I’ve done that for about a year now and it’s be...

Time To Experiment My POTA activations are supposed to be recreation. That is, they should involve setting up the station, operating it, getting enough contacts for an activation - or not! - an...

Support Your Parks Weekend is a seasonal event run by the folks at Parks On The Air. Since getting into POTA, I've been trying to activate and hunt for each of the events as they pass. More than ...

After all of the work in getting my computer setup for field work again, I was itching to get outside. Easter Sunday presented a very nice opportunity. The weather was stunning. It was in the mid...

There are plenty of jokes about POTA devotees checking maps before going on vaction for new parks to activate along the way. In this case, my family decided that we'd spend spring break at Mammot...

The day was just too nice. It was in the mid-50s and the skies were clear. There was a lot of wind, which isn't always great, but staying inside simply wasn't an option. Originally, I wasn't goin...

The Issue: In the world of ham radio, we have what I consider to be a bit of a problem. We have a very deep addiction to the Microsoft Windows ecosystem. Why is it a problem? Because Windows it...

This past Sunday, the weather was supposed to be in the mid-40F range and clear with something call "The Sun" in the sky. I seemed to remember this yellow orb from my childhood and thought that i...

A few months back, I hit a real snag in my Winlink setup. At some point, my Surface GO 2 - post Win11 update - created a situation with Winlink where I couldn't get the window to open reliably wh...

Sunday afternoon it got up into the mid-40sF and was bright and sunny. It's the kind of sunlight that warms a person who is sitting in it. One might even be able to ditch the coat for a little wh...

Right after I finished posting my last entry, I learned that my family was essentially going off in different directions. It was sunny out and the temperatures were in the mid-to-upper 40sF and t...

With a long holiday weekend, I thought I would get to the park more than I did. The weather was not at all interested in cooperating. It was sitting in the 20s with some significant wind on Frida...

Every year, PCARS hosts a club contest for QRP operations in February. Astute readers of the blog will note that the last one was in…November? Of 2022? Well, things happened back in February of 2...

Northeast Ohio has always been grey and nasty through the winter. At least that's been the case as long as I've been here. There's not really any point in being down about it. It's the state of t...

In NE Ohio, real winter is in January and February. The world gets cold. The skies are grey. That giant orb of light in the sky that we see all summer? It fades into memory. The stuff of stories ...

Monday was MLK Day. There was, surprisingly, nothing on the calendar for the household. No service projects. No Scouting events. Nothing. Just a cold, clear day in January. Without much thought, ...

The grey of the week was oppressive. People may not know it, but for Seattle's reputation for grey skies, NE Ohio beats it for cloud cover over the course of a year. Honestly? It can get heavy af...

It was a long bit of time off for me this holiday. I grabbed what amounted to about two weeks of time off and spent most of it with my family around the house. It was a wonderfully low-key holida...

It has started to get chilly here in NE Ohio. Not a surprise for December. I had a long week and decided that the thing that I really needed to do was get out in the field. There is a wonderful s...

A very brief field report. On the 26th, my wife, the puppy, and I went back to the Cuyahoga Valley National Park - K-0020 for a dog walk and a little radio. The weather was almost too nice. It wa...

Well, I did it. I was pretty sure that I wouldn’t hit the Oasis Activator award for K-0020 this year, but my long birthday weekend brought it so close that a quick trip out to the park the day be...

It was a big week for me with a milestone birthday and all, so I took a couple of days off that led to a four day weekend. I activated Cuyahoga Valley National Park - K-0020 on the 17th and just ...

November 17 and 18 are off days in my world to celebrate my circumnavigating the sun one more time. And what does it mean when there is time off? POTA, my friends. POTA. Nothing but POTA. All day...

There is probably a strong case to make Cuyahoga Valley National Park - K-0020 a topic of its own on this blog since all of the posts about POTA operations of late have been about it. Or so it se...

So I snuck out to the park Friday and I figured that would be all the activating I could get in for the weekend. But I forgot about the time change as we leave DST behind. When our Rottie slapped...

Each year, the Portage County Amateur Radio Service aka PCARS hosts a QRP “contest” at Fred Fuller Park in Kent, OH. It usually occurs in February, but because of many, many factors, it was delay...

There are some days when the stars align just right. This was already set to be a big weekend for radio, but I managed to squeak out some time after work and before my family left for a Scouting ...

Time to title these posts differently, I think… My family was otherwise occupied this past Saturday, so I did the only thing that made sense: I loaded up my bike and cycled off to Cuyahoga Vall...

Before I left for NC, I spent some time on the POTA site looking for parks close to my hotel. On the drive down, Pilot Mountain was something I passed along the way. It was really pretty to see f...

The last time I traveled for work was in 2019, which was before the POTA bug got into me. This past week, I traveled by Jeep to NC for some meetings. I naturally added my IC-705 and assorted bits...

It was a windy Saturday morning with plenty of sunshine. Naturally, ones thoughts turn to cycling and a trip to the park. Why not toss the radio into the panniers and ride? Why not indeed! That...

A mid-week activation! Something that's important to note is that I work from home. Given the weird nature of my gig and meetings and a team that spans the globe, sometimes my work hours get st...

So it's starting to look like I only ever go to one spot. That's not really the case, but I am trying to get the Repeat Offender Activator award for Cuyahoga Valley National Park - K-0020. There ...

It was a Saturday morning and a great time for an activation out at my favorite spot: Cuyahoga Valley National Park - K-0020. Yes, yet again, my wife and I got on our bikes and rode out to the pa...

This past weekend was a good one for radio. I managed to squeak in two activations of Cuyahoga Valley National Park - K-0020. Along with that, I tried something new with my mast and my bike. On...

And we're back to Cuyahoga Valley National Park - K-0020. As has become our custom, my wife and I got on the bikes again and rode out to have a good morning on the trail. And, as usual. I brought...

OSPOTA 2022 The first Saturday after Labor Day each year is the Ohio State Parks On The Air contest (OSPOTA). For me, 2022 has been a year of POTA and being as I’m really into it and it’s spons...

This biking thing is getting fun. A quick zip out the the Cuyahoga Valley National Park [K-0020] and back isn't a big deal. On the Saturday in question, my wife and I decided to head out. It was ...

My wife and I have been big on the cycling thing since we acquired our new bikes. Since the previous weekend's trip to Cuyahoga Valley National Park [K-0020] was so much fun, we decided to do it ...

It's been a while since my last trip out to a park for an activation. This time of year, things get really busy and it's hard to make time to get out to a park for a bit. So I intentionally put t...

On Sunday, 24-Jul I decided to run out and grab a quick activation while everyone else was doing something else. I headed out to Wingfoot State Wildlife Area [K-9518]. It was warm and a bit humid...

The Support Your Parks event for POTA enthusiasts was the weekend of 15-17 July, 2022. I got out for it in the spring and decided to go out to support the effort. I only had a couple of hours to ...

Since we got a camper, we started spending time with Hipcamp. It's a place where you can find private campgrounds. In essence, someone has a chunk of land and they set it up for camping and rent ...

My family decided that we would take our camper on its first big vacation trip and that our destination would be the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. My last trip up that way was many, many years ago...

My family took our first trip out in our new camper. Naturally, I took the radio along. We were in a private campground on the OH/PA border. Literally on the border. Walking on the street had us ...

I headed out this weekend twice. The first was out to Wingfoot Lake State Park [K-3516]. I got there Saturday afternoon and prepared for a Jeep activation in the parking lot because, well, there ...

It's been a while since my last activation. It doesn't mean that there's nothing going on around here, but it does mean that radio time in the field has been limited. It's been for good reasons l...

An Easter activation! We got home from our muddy camping trip and decided to, well, go out to another park. This time it was Portage Lakes State Park [K-1984]. As my son would say, "Literally 198...

My wife and I decided that Easter weekend would be a good one for a camping trip. It turned out to be a quick one and one that we did without the kids because, well, they do a lot of camping with...

The Cooperrider-Kent Bog State Nature Preserve is a very small park near my house and seemed like a natural place to go to grab a quick activation. I arrived Sunday morning and it was grey and co...

My last trip into the field was to activate Tinker’s Creek State Park [K-1997] and it ended in a cold, wet mess with only 4 contacts in the log. This Saturday, I wanted to settle the score and ge...

When I looked at the weather going up to the weekend, I thought that the weather would be cold with a touch of snow, perhaps, and that would drive people out of the park. Which park? Any park. Ti...

This weekend wasn’t a great one for portable operations in NE Ohio. The weather was cold and rainy. As someone who spends a lot of time outside, I get that there is No Bad Weather, Only Bad Gear....

I took Friday off and managed to get out to Cuyahoga Valley National Park (K-0020) for a bit with my wife and her dog. I decided to leave The Mighty Nacho at home as the weather was questionable ...

With a couple of failed activation attempts behind me, I decided to turn my park trips into experiments. Last week, I tried a different approach to my Jeep mounted MP1. That didn't really do much...

This was supposed to be a quick trip out to Wingfoot Lake State Park (K-3516). The variables for this operation were narrowed to simply making 10 FT8/FT4 contacts. I will lead with this: yet agai...

Another set of experiments and another list of lessons that were learned through experience. Part of the joy of ham radio is in the challenges that it provides. One can dial in the gear very tigh...

This year I have several Stupid Arbitrary Goals that center on radio. One of them is a number of portable operations and the other is activating parks. I decided on these SAGs later than I might ...

In the course of my life, I have found that in various pursuits, I tend to favor things that have some challenge to them. This was true with my selection of pieces to learn for the guitar when I ...

Display table with a MS Surface Go 2 tablet and IC-705 running WSJT-X. This past weekend, PCARS went out to the Akron Maker Faire to show off ham radio. We put a SuperAntenna up on the roof...