It’s too hot for activating parks in Florida so I went on the road. I was heading to a music festival and made some stops on the way to activate a few parks. Unfortunately there was flooding in the town next to the music festival which contaminated the water and they were forced to cancel the festival. Huge bummer, but at least I got in some camping and ham radio.
First I activated Uwharrie National Forest in North Carolina. I stayed at the West Morris Mountain campground. There were only two other people there and one of them was heading to the same music festival. He ended up meeting up with us before the festival and we went in together.
I didn’t make a lot of contacts here because of the trees.
I stayed in Baltimore the following night and then got a call from the ranger at the campground I was planning to stay at (World’s End in PA) that it was flooded and they had to cancel my reservation. I called the ranger station at the Rothrock State Forest in PA and they gave me a spot. Unfortunately it was rainy and lightning most of the time so I didn’t set up the antenna. Since camping in the state forests of PA is free, you just have to get a permit, I decided to keep doing that.
The following night I camped in the Tuscarora State Forest. I checked the weather around PA and picked this one because it was supposed to be less rainy. Again the trees affected the signal but I made a few contacts.
The final night of camping in PA I found the Tioga State Forest. This is fairly close to my hometown and I’m surprised I had never heard of it before. They call it the Grand Canyon of Pennsylvania. It was a 50 minute drive down a dirt road to get to this spot but what a view. I had a good signal on 40m here and ran a pileup for an hour which got me over 60 contacts.
I’m heading to Ireland next, only bringing my HT, we’ll see how that works. I brought it to London earlier in the year and didn’t hear much.