Contesting was on the amateur radio schedule this weekend. In typical KB6NU fashion, however, the contesting was very casual.
On Saturday, I didn’t get down to WA2HOM until noon, and shortly after I fired up the rig, Ovide, K8EV, showed up. We talked for about an hour, during which we made no contacts. After Ovide left for lunch, I made a few contacts in the Ukranian DX contest. Nothing spectacular except for an A65 station. That’s a new country for the WA2HOM log.
In the evening, I got on 40m and made 100 Qs in the ARRL Sweepstakes. I wasn’t going to stay up so late, but as my totals began to climb, I decided to stick it out until I made 100 contacts or scored 10,000 points. At 1am, I hit the sack with 100 contacts and nearly 11,000 points.
On Sunday, I had a couple of things that I wanted to do besides working the contest. One was to practice my bowling. I’ve just been terrible for the past couple of weeks, and it’s been embarassing. Another was to build a 10m loop antenna.
Well, I couldn’t resist. Before going to the bowling alley, I made several contacts on 15m. When I got back, I ate some lunch, and then actually built the antenna. Before I got around to hanging it up outside, I got sucked into working some more of the contest. I spent the next several hours working the contest, quitting at 4pm to make dinner. At that point, I had 150 contacts.
After dinner, I watched a movie with my XYL, but when the movie was over about 8:30pm, I went down to the shack again. I was surprised to hear the contest still going on. I had assumed it was just a 24-hour event, but Sweepstakes is a 30-hour contest. So, of course, I had to work the last hour or so.
It was fortuitous, too. I managed to work three or four new multipliers during that last hour and a half. When all was said and done, I ended up with 189 contacts, 66 sections, and a total of 24,948 points. I think that next year, I’m going to try for a “clean sweep.”
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