After a week of mostly chilly temperatures, we were blessed with some unseasonably warm temperatures today. With temperatures approaching 80 degrees (F), I decided to do a little hiking on Monocacy Hill.
The Monocacy Hill Recreation Area is a little gem of a place, tucked away in Berks County, Pennsylvania. Even though it’s only about 10 miles away, I had never heard of it until I worked WA3WSJ there in December of last year. This area has some beautiful hiking trails.
I hiked in about a mile so to the top of the hill and set up my KX3 in the middle of large group of boulders. Since I didn’t know what to expect, antenna-wise, I brought my AlexLoop along in my backpack. In a few minutes, I was up and running.
I started out on 20 meters and immediately came across Joe N2CX who was doing an NPOTA activation from the Benjamin Franklin National Memorial Affiliated Area (AA03) in Philadelphia. Joe had quite a pile-up going, so I waited until it thinned out a bit and worked him. I amazed that I was able to work Philly on 20 meters. I guess my elevation might have helped.
After that, the bands seemed to fade out on me. I tried calling CQ on 30 meters and 40 meters with no luck. In between attempts, I had some nice chats about ham radio with some of the curious hikers going by. I checked the Band Conditions website and it looked like propagation had taken a turn for the worse. I decided to pack up and enjoy the hike back to the trailhead.
It was a great day for a little hiking. There probably won’t be any more days like this one for quite a while. A few more contacts would have been nice, though.
72, Craig WB3GCK
