[NLRS] Eclipse-o-Mania --- Long, but I hope entertaining

[Zack Widup]

Glad you all had some fun over the weekend. It was a mixed bag for me.

I overslept an hour on Saturday morning; then, when I got to my
favorite site (a hilltop in EN50rl) the only thunderstorm in all of
central Illinois was right over me. I had to wait till it cleared out.

I made four 10 GHz QSO's from that QTH. I worked W9ZIH and W9SNR in
the Chicago area, N9LB and KA9VDU in Wisconsin. KA9VDU had some height
advantages in EN53ba but still he was booming in at my end and vice
versa.  N9LB was fairly loud, too. KA9VDU turned out to be my farthest
QSO over the weekend, at 303 km.

I then drove to Ohlmann Cemetery near Pana, IL in EM59ji. I worked
W9SNR and W9ZIH from there. Signals were decent. I also worked AF4JF
77 km to the west and KO0Z 2.2 km to the west.

I then drove to what we call the "Dow" site (a mile east of Dow, IL)
to an old abaldoned AT&T tower on a hill. I had the peak of the hill
in the way of W9ZIH and W9SNR. I also had a hill in the way of KO0Z. I
made no QSO's there, so I drove to the home of Bob N5RP about 5 miles
south of Murphysboro, IL, at the center of the path of eclipse
totality.

Sunday morning Bob and I drove to Bald Knob in EM57hn. I tried to work
W9ZIH, AF4JF and KO0Z with no luck. So I made no QSO's from there,
either.

I stayed at Bob's place over the weekend for the eclipse. Several
other ham friends came down to view the eclipse. We had a clear sky
and a spectacular view. We were at the point of longest duration, too,
at 2 minutes and 42 seconds. That is an event I will always remember.

As strange as it may seem, Bob is also right in the center of the path
of totality of the solar eclipse coming up in 2024. Hopefully we'll
all still be around by then.

73, Zack W9SZ<div id="DAB4FAD8-2DD7-40BB-A1B8-4E2AA1F9FDF2"><br />
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