Congratulation are due to Jerry Fuller who has just achieved a memorable first QSO on HF.

He reports "Just wanted to share with you the news of my very first QSO on HF!

17:34 hrs BST. 18.132 Mhz. K6YRA in Los Angeles, California, Rx 59, my TX 58. Using a full length G5RV and the TenTec Corsair II."

Hello chaps - sorry if we disappointed you yesterday. But Mike, you've forgotten something most important: LONG LIVE DXFC! There is a pattern emerging: if it's just a crazy day-trip then it's dash in dash out, get on the air for a few QSOs, whereas an overnight stay allows a more sensible operation.

Declan, EI6FR, met us at Dublin airport and drove us one hour up the M1 to Northern Ireland. The only way to know you've crossed the border is when the hard shoulder line turns from yellow to white and the road-signs are British colours as opposed to the Irish green/yellow.

We immediately parked up on some empty land, a mile or so from the motorway, strung up the dipole in pouring rain and howling wind and attached the jump-leads to the car battery. Around 1pm GI4IRN was QRV for a handful of QSOs on 20m and 40m and CQ'd for several minutes on 7021 but the HA-DX contest was filling the bands and the car was rocking in the wind. G3SXW already had this DXFC+QRV point when doing NFD there several years ago so did not operate. We quickly packed up and drove back towards Dublin.

Lunch at the Bloody Stream pub in Howth was indeed very pleasant, but time for only two pints and a quick sandwich. At just over 1 Euro to the pound this was not cheap! Then straight to the Museum of Vintage Radio, EI0MAR, a really amazing Aladdin's cave of radio paraphernalia situated in a Martello Tower, well worth a visit. Their 40m dipole was put to good use with several CW QSOs as EI/G3SXW and EI/G4IRN around 4pm. Then straight back to DUB airport and to LGW, two hours delayed by the storms that afternoon. Good fun! Cost: £28 for the Ryanair ticket plus lunch.

EA6 will be overnight at Can Pastilla, just near Palma airport. So, with any luck EA6/G3SXW and EA6/G5LP will be QRV for a few hundred QSOs and might even manage to generate some mini pile-ups, on 20m and 40m. This will be on Feb 24/25th, probably 40m in the evening and then 20m the next morning. I hope to report all the gory details at the Clandon lunch on Sunday 1st. This Ryanair ticket, by the way, is a massive £38 all-in, each!

But before then it's a week in Hong Kong for G4BWP's wedding, with side-trips to China, East Malaysia and Brunei. No QRV expected unless I can fix up some guest-operating at the last minute.

Oh, and March 9/10th it's EA8/G3SXW and EA8/G5LP overnight in Las Palmas Gran Canaria, again with some 20m and 40m QRV. Yes, I am a traveloholic, tiz true!

73 de Roger/G3SXW.

Congratulations to all who took part in this years AFS - CW contest held on Sunday 11th January. As in 2008 the Club was able to submit logs from two full teams of four, these being as follows :-

WEY VALLEY ARG “A” - Claimed Score 6,610

G0EFO 1,990
G3IAF 1,840
G4HZV 1,580
M3OSP 1,200

Team Score:

WEY VALLEY ARG “B” - Claimed Score 2,910

M0GJH 980
G0KDL 900
G2DBH 520
G3GJX 510

We missed Roger, G3SXW on Friday but he was not idle.

A fleeting visit with Lional G5LP, flying to Split, Croatia very early on Friday morning (17th) they drove a hire car for 90 mins to cross the border into Bosnia- Hertzegovina, found a field, threw up a dipole into a tree, found 12 volts fron the car battery and were on the air as E7/G3SXW and E7G5LP. They each operated for a short while, then packed up and back across the border into Croatia for a vital component of Micro DX trips- a slap-up lunch !

The travellers then found their hotel near Split airport, and got on the bands as 9A/G3SXW and 9A/G5LP, then a slap up dinner ! They met Tom, 9A2AA. Then on Saturday morning a flight back to Gatwick. Just 24 hours on Balkan soil. Roger said 'It was a hoot' and probably a 100 qso's too.

Nice work Roger and tks the report.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, G3GJX has managed to manouvre his wheel chair into the shack and this week's log showed, amongst other regular dx, CO8LY- Cuba, PZ5RA- Suriname, 9L1X- Sierra Leone. Sun Spots Ahoy !

The VooDoo Contest Group will enter the CQ World-Wide CW contest on November 29-30th from Conakry, Guinea, as 3X5A in the multi-multi category. This will be the group's 15th straight year in multi-multi from West Africa and our 20th straight year participating in CQWWCW. In the 2007 contest 3X5A won this category, first place world, our 6th outright win. This will be our second visit to 3X5A. We will have our usual 8-9 British and American operators, seven one-KW stations and a dozen antennas. We will also be active as 3X5A (no personal call-signs) before the contest, including WARC bands and maybe some RTTY. QSL manager: G3SXW, direct (qrz.com) or e-mail to g3sxw at btinternet.com for a bureau reply, or paper QSL via bureau; also LoTW. No QSLing rules: just normal practice. More information at: http://voodoocontestgroup.com/

Here is a brief synopsis of our weekend trip to SM, OH0 and OJ0.

Olof G0CKV met me at Stockholm's Arlanda airport on Thursday 10th July at 1115 local time. We then headed to Grisselhamn to catch the ferry to Aland island, OH0. This is a 90-minute trip and I made best use of Olof's fantastic mobile set-up to make 22 CW QSOs on 20 metres, signing SM/G3SXW/M, whilst on the move. This included M0AAC, G3IAF, G3GJX, G4IRN, G5LP. We were then QRT for the ferry journey, just two hours to Eckero, time for a spot of lunch. By 2100 local we were well watered and fed so I fired up as OH0/G3SXW/M from our overnight log cabin accommodation and made another 27 CW QSOs, including G4PTJ, G5LP as well as DX in the form of 7Z1HL (Saudi Arabia) and A61Q (Dubai). Olof's mobile set-up is so effective - we were being heard very well by all stations.

Olof also has a very effective APRS set-up. I knew the concept but had not previously experienced it. It is completely automated: just switch on the VHF rig and our location was fed via GPS to a web-site. I know that several friends were tracking our movements, as I had done the previous day as Olof drove from UK to Kiel and across to Sweden. What a hoot!

The next morning it was 30 minutes in a speed-boat, at over 30 knots, to Market Reef. The weather, also on the return trip, was perfect with flat seas, so landing was easy. By this time we had been joined by Seppo OH1VR, Markus OH3RM and Bob W6RGG. There was a LOT of gear on that boat! We set up antennas and stations and made 1,850 QSOs in the IARU Contest, signing OJ0A. We then retraced our steps on Monday, back to Eckero and to Arlanda.

Abiding memory, apart from the fun amateur radio, was the beauty of all these places, lots of space and quiet. Lapping waves, sea-birds and CW: what a perfect combination! Market Reef is flat rocks, just a little above sea-level, almost devoid of vegetation. There is no tide and the water is only brackish. I will try to write a longer description of this trip for CDXC Digest.

73 de Roger/G3SXW.

The VooDoo Contest Group plans to do CQWW CW in November from 3X, Guinea. We will move our one tonne of equipment overland from Mali where we have been TZ5A for the past two years.

The eight-man team this year is AA7A, G3SXW, G4BWP, G4IRN, GM3YTS, K4UEE, K5VT, KC7V. The contest call-sign and personal call-signs will be announced later. QSL manager for the contest will be G3SXW. QSLs for personal call-signs go to the home-call.

As usual, we will enter the Multi-Multi category of the contest with mono-band antennas for all six bands and kilowatt amplifiers. This time we will be immediately beside salt-water, a real luxury!

Immediately before and after the contest we expect to be on the bands with personal call-signs. Also, AA7A + KC7V will do EME for several days.

See here for full report Roger, G3SXW