[Elecraft] Annoying Contests

[zumbruns at comcast.net]

Hello to the group.  Well, what can I say.  I've been a ham for many years but have never worked a CW contest before.  Well, I've had the opportunity to spend some time in Hawaii and I just happened to be here for the ARRL CW contest.  I took the K3 and Buddipole antenna with me to Hawaii.  I was suspect about the Buddipole antenna but my friend KI0KB insisted that I take his with me.  The wife and I are staying in a Condo on the Mauna Lani Resort on the Big Island north of Kona .  I setup the antenna outside the condo next to a lava field next to the golf course.  It has the 8 foot extension on the tripod base and I used the 9 foot whip with two counterpoise wires out into the lava field.  I took the RigExpert AA-54 with me and it was easy to prune the coil for 40 meters.  For 20 through 10 meters I adjusted the counterpoise for 20 meters and used the antenna tuner in the K3 to get the best swr on the bands below 20 meters.  What can I say.  The K3 worked like a charm.  Being in Hawaii is a bit different in that you are the DX and you try to work stateside.  My CW was a bit rusty but that's one of the beauties of the K3.  It does a very good job of decoding CW.  So when I would miss a letter of the call the K3 would catch it and I was good to go.  I have the 5 pole 500Hz CW filter in the K3 and the receiver was amazing.  I had 20 over Japanese stations right next to Stateside stations and was able to copy them without all the hash and inter-mode despite the key clicks from you know where.  I had a ball.  You know why the K3 works so well?  It's because Wayne and others are active hams and like to operate.  Wayne likes Contests!  Anyway, I again have to thank Elecraft for putting the fun back into the hobby.  To think I could travel to Hawaii with a K3 and a Buddipole and have so much fun.  BTW after the contest I was listening of 20 meters SSB and there was Sabu VU2ELJ.  He finished talking with a guy on the West Coast and I called him.  He was a S-2 with me but I gave him a call.  Guess what?  He came right back to me!  I've never worked India before but the K3 and the Buddipole vertical got through from the lava field, ha.  Best 73, Steve W0SZ