After some damaging storms this week, we were blessed with some great weather for the weekend. Today was a perfect day to head outdoors for the annual Cookie Crumble QRP Contest.
The Cookie Crumble is a QRP contest run by Tim Carter W3ATB and Emily Saldana WC3R. It was inspired by the cookies that Emily used to make during the 2016 National Parks on the Air event. You get bonus points for working stations designated as Cookie Monsters. What’s unique about this contest is that you lose points for working Burnt Cookie stations. In any event, it’s a lot of fun.
This year, I headed out to my daughter’s farm to operate from one of the fields. My setup was almost identical to the setup I used last weekend. I used a half-square antenna made from cheap speaker wire, along with my KX3. I set up my chair under a shady tree—for a while, at least.
I wasn’t out for too long, but I worked 10 stations in the contest. One of those was a Cookie Monster station. Fortunately, I didn’t encounter any burnt cookie stations.
Some of the highlights from today included:
- My first QSO was with my old friend, Carter N3AO, down in Virginia. It was great to hear him again.
- I worked VE2DDZ, who was doing a joint Cookie Crumble and SOTA activation. Malcolm had a great signal into Pennsylvania.
- Outside of the contest, I worked WD8RIF who was doing a Parks-on-the-Air (POTA) activation from Ohio.
After a while, I began to lose my shade and I was starting to get a little sunburned. Right before I started tearing down, I heard another old friend, Dan KA3D, very faintly. I gave him a couple of calls but, sadly, he couldn’t hear me. We were probably a little too close for 40M. Maybe next time.
It was a great day to be outside playing radio. I also got some more on-the-air experience with my homebrew half-square antenna, which I’ll document in my next post.
Thanks for Tim W3ATB and Emily WC3R for running this fun contest.
72, Craig WB3GCK
WB3GCK QRP Amateur Radio 
Also a great “warm-up” for Field Day!
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