[MAMS] 10 GHz contest first weekend

[Zack Widup]

Well, Saturday was a disaster but Sunday was much better.

I went south on Saturday in hopes of working some people by St. Louis. I
started out about 15 miles southwest of Shelbyville, IL, on a hill called
Corley Ridge. I couldn't tell how good this location was from aerial
photos. It turned out there were some trees just in the way of St. Louis
but I could hear the St. Louis beacon at first through them. I tried to
work AF4JF in St. Louis with no luck. It was about a 100 mile path. I tried
KO0Z who was closer, about 50 miles away. I heard him for a bit but he
never heard me and then I couldn't hear him, either. By this time (9 am)
the beacon was also gone. I also tried with W9ZIH, who I could work on 144
MHz. We didn't hear each other at all on 10 GHz.

I found a hill about 15 miles south on my map. It showed a drive to a
circle at the top and was labeled "Lookout." I thought it might be a good
site so I drove down there. The last mile of road was disintegrating
asphalt, loose gravel and potholes the size of my car. There were steep
climbs and declines all along the route. I bottomed out my car a dozen
times and pulled an exhaust pipe loose. I am calling it "The Road To Hell."
When I got to the little road that went to to the top, it was barricaded
with "Road Closed." So much for that. I drove back to the area where I'd
been to see if there was any better spot. There wasn't. I had planned on at
least working Ron KO0Z. then driving about 30 miles east and trying again,
then driving another 20 miles east and repeating. Since we didn't make it
over a 50 mile distance I just gave up and went home with no 10 GHz QSO's
on Saturday. I fixed the car exhaust when I got home.

On Sunday I started out on the hill in EN50rl and worked Ron W9ZIH as soon
as I got set up, with great signals both ways. We chatted for about 15
minutes on SSB on 10 GHz. I tried to work Jim W9SNR who was in EN62cc but
we were unsuccessful. Jim then drove to EN51xr and I waited. He discovered
a rig problem which he remedied, and we were able to work on 10 GHz. I then
drove to three other locations, hills in EN50wl, EN50xh and EN50ue. I
worked W9ZIH and W9SNR in all of these locations. So I did a lot of driving
but got some QSO's as a result.

I drove a total of about 400 miles this weekend. So I guess that's 50 miles
per QSO.

I hope the September weekend is good. I am planning on driving to Lake
Michigan in Wisconsin to work people on the Michigan side.

73, Zack W9SZ