GW/NW-057 Foel Cae’rberllan

GW/NW-057 Foel Cae’rberllan

22/09/2016

David M0YDH and I had arranged to undertake 2 joint activations the following day so I decided to book a B&B in Dolgellau to avoid the long journey up in the morning prior to meeting up with David. As Val was not joining us she suggested I look for a summit that I could activate on the way up to Dolgellau. I chose NW-057 Foel Cae’rberllan and parked at the car park for Castell y Bere and headed South for 100m to cross into a field via stile gingerly making my way to the summit due to a knee injury. I tried to avoid any steep inclines hence the curved nature of my initial approach to the summit…worked well.

My GPS track

Entrance to Castell y Bere from Car Park

The stile...head diagonally across the field towards a wicket gate

The wicket gate...walk diagonally uphill across the next field

Walk diagonally off the track here and head up towards a gate

Looking back. the diagonal track approaching the gate

On the zig-zag track..farmer on his quad heading up...offered me a lift but not SOTA

No phone signal on this one so I turned towards Cardigan Bay and gave a call on 2m for Don GW0PLP in Aberporth…bingo… Don was there and he soon spotted me for 60m on Sotawatch…thanks Don.

11:05z	GW0PLP	144MHz	FM	Don
11:23z	G4BXD	5MHz	SSB	Ben
11:28z	G0FEX	5MHz	SSB	Ken
11:28z	G4WHA/A	5MHz	SSB	Geoff
11:29z	G4IAR	5MHz	SSB	Dave
11:30z	G4WSB	5MHz	SSB	Bill
11:32z	G6TUH	5MHz	SSB	Mike
11:33z	G4OIG	5MHz	SSB	Gerald
11:33z	G1BLJ	5MHz	SSB	Steve
11:34z	GI0AZB	5MHz	SSB	Ian
11:34z	MW0XOT	5MHz	SSB	John
11:35z	M0NTC	5MHz	SSB	Gez
11:36z	GW6DGU	5MHz	SSB	Roy
11:37z	PA7ZEE	5MHz	SSB	Geert
11:39z	G4ATX	5MHz	SSB	Phil
11:41z	G0TDM	5MHz	SSB	John
11:41z	M0JLA	5MHz	SSB	Rod
11:43z	G3HYG	5MHz	SSB	Douglas
11:47z	GI0HWD	5MHz	SSB	John

 My SOTA station

I changed the links and another spot from Don and I was away on 40m with a mixture of UK and EU stations…My little linear was working well as it was nice to hear Barry M0IML calling in as normally he can’t hear anyone with his 5/9 of noise.

11:51z	G4WSB	7MHz	SSB	Bill
11:52z	ON4EM	7MHz	SSB	Manuel
11:52z	G0VWP	7MHz	SSB	Terry
11:53z	EA2CKX	7MHz	SSB	Pedro
11:53z	DJ9BX	7MHz	SSB	Mike
11:53z	CT1HIX	7MHz	SSB	Carlos Gomes
11:54z	M0IML	7MHz	SSB	Barry
11:55z	DJ5AV	7MHz	SSB	Michael
11:55z	OK3KW	7MHz	SSB
11:56z	M0WBG	7MHz	SSB	Neil
11:57z	GM0AXY	7MHz	SSB	Ken
11:57z	GM4YMM	7MHz	SSB	Christine
11:58z	2E0OOM	7MHz	SSB	Mike
11:59z	GW2HFR	7MHz	SSB	Jonathan
11:59z	M0MDA	7MHz	SSB	Mick
12:00z	G0FEX	7MHz	SSB	Ken
12:01z	G6TUH	7MHz	SSB	Mike
12:04z	ON6ZQ	7MHz	SSB	Christophe
12:04z	SM7DIE	7MHz	SSB	Tore
12:06z	F6EWB	7MHz	SSB	Jean Paul
12:07z	MI0MVP	7MHz	SSB	Alex
12:07z	DF5WA	7MHz	SSB	Berthold
12:08z	G4WHA/A	7MHz	SSB	Geoff
12:09z	M6CJF	7MHz	SSB	Carl
12:09z	GW6OVD	7MHz	SSB	Mal

Towards Cardigan bay

I had a bonus s2s on 20m with Jan OK2PDT/p on OK/PL-015 which was worth 10 points…thank  you Jan for calling me. Two Stateside contacts also made the summit activation worthwhile so thanks to George and Bill for the contacts.

12:17z	OE5REO	14MHz	SSB	Martin
12:18z	N1GB	14MHz	SSB	George
12:19z	EU2MM	14MHz	SSB	Vladimir
12:19z	S56IHX	14MHz	SSB	Marjan
12:19z	OK2PDT/P	14MHz	SSB	Jan s2s
12:21z	SP9AMH	14MHz	SSB	Mariuz
12:21z	SP8RHP	14MHz	SSB	Robert
12:22z	OH3GZ	14MHz	SSB	Jukka
12:23z	W1OW	14MHz	SSB	Bill
12:23z	OH3GBS	14MHz	SSB	Jouko
12:24z	RV9UCN	14MHz	SSB	Alexander
12:25z	GW0PLP	14MHz	SSB	Don
12:25z	YL3AD	14MHz	SSB	Janis
12:26z	S58MU	14MHz	SSB	Milan
12:27z	OE6GND	14MHz	SSB	Gerhard
12:27z	CT1APN	14MHz	SSB	Antonio

 It had been a pleasant morning and part afternoon of activation as not only I’d had some very good contacts but the sun had kept me company :)

Been there,done that...another unique

On the way to the B&B at The Ivy House, Dolgellau (recommended) I stopped off at Abergynolwyn railway station which is part of the Talyllyn narrow gauge railway…just managed to get a few pics of the last train of the day :)

Train approaching Abergynolwyn station

The engine

My activation set up:-  (HF) Yaesu FT817 (5 watts) (4Ah LiPo),  UK-MX 50M linear (for 817) and 12V 4 Ah LiPO battery,  3 band link dipole (60/40/20 (+15m+80m extensions),  (VHF) Yaesu FT270 (5watts) into a ‘cable tie’ dipole.. Antenna support - 7m Fishing pole.

Thanks everyone for the contacts

73 Allan GW4VPX