On a warm and windy April afternoon, Josh Senefeld, N8VXR, conducted a successful Parks on the Air activation of Burr Oak State Park, US-1939, and the North Country National Scenic Trail, US-4239.
Josh arrived to Dock #2 and found a group of people fishing, however, the campground located at Dock #2 was empty and slightly flooded. He drove around the campground and found Site #4 to be ideal and not flooded. After parking, Josh started to unload his gear and began setting up at 1825 UTC. He placed his antenna in the back of the site away from any trees, he put the ground spike in the ground, attached his Wolf River Coils 213" stainless steel whip, and unrolled his window screen, then retracted about 6" of the whip, and ran the coax to the picnic table. He was on the air by 1839 UTC.
Josh's setup with the Heil Proset Elite headset.
The antenna in the rear of the site.
Burr Oak Lake from the north edge of the dock.
Josh had borrowed the Ohio University Amateur Radio Club's Heil Proset Elite headset and had to adjust his microphone gain before finding an empty frequency. After identifying a frequency, Josh started calling CQ and immediately heard back from N4DKN from US-6460 in Alabama at 1839 UTC, his first Park-to-Park contact. His next would come from WV1W, who also gave the club call of W1CWA, from US-9896 in Connecticut at 1849 UTC. Josh's only other Park-to-Park QSO while running the frequency was from N5MCY from US-2359 in Louisiana at 1853 UTC. After things started to slow down, Josh decided to hunt a couple more Park-to-Park contacts. First up was AD4XT from US-1038 in Alabama at 1902 UTC. Next up was AA5JF from US-9784 in Georgia at 1907 UTC.
Josh then decided to switch bands and retuned to 10 meters, he was not able to make any contacts on 10, then he tried 15, and also got no contacts. Josh then decided to attach the Sporty Forty Coil from Wolf River Coils and successfully hunted more Park-to-Park contacts! First up was K4IA who was in four parks, US-9935, US-4581, US-4567, and US-0935, all in Virginia at 1929 UTC. Then he found KZ4CP from US-3815 in Kentucky at 1933 UTC.
Overall, Josh made 31 QSOs per Park, 11 of them being Park-to-Park, in 52 minutes of operating time. All of his QSOs were SSB and were made with 50 watts of output power.
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