POTA Activation - Burr Oak State Park, US-1939, and the North Country National Scenic Trail, US-4239, April 26, 2024

On a warm April morning, 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, his third stop on his hunt to complete the POTA Rover Warthog Award for activating 5 Parks on the Air references in a single UTC day. Thankfully, this stop was a 2-fer, so Josh only had to stop at one more park!

Josh arrived to an empty Dock #2 at 1535 UTC and backed in his car so he could set up his antenna behind the car and have a view view of Burr Oak Lake while he activated. He decided to continue to operate on the 40 meter band, so he re-attached his Wolf River Coil Sporty Forty coil to the base of the 213" whip. This time, Josh decided to activate from his car since at his next and last stop, he wouldn't have access to a picnic table, so he wanted to make sure he could safely setup his station in his car. After his failed attempt to activate Lake Logan State Park, US-1969, where Josh's broke his IC-718's screen, he's been hesitant to activate from his car, however, he found a way to make it work safely this time! His station consisted of his Icom IC-718, Wolf River Coils 213” vertical whip with a window screen ground plane and Sporty Forty coil, all mounted on a ground spike, and fed with 25’ of RG-8X coax that ran out of the passengers side window. Josh also decided to connect his rig to his car's sound system since he had the correct cables and adapters for it, which did make it easier to hear the rig since the speaker was facing down towards the seat. Josh decided to also continue to use the newest version of the HAMRS logging application (v 1.0.7) on his Evolve III laptop. He was on the air by 1546 UTC.

The view of Burr Oak Lake.

Josh's station setup in his car.

His antenna off to the side.

Josh found 7.224 MHz to still be clear, so he spotting himself of the POTA website and started calling CQ. His first contact was with K9JFB at 1548 UTC, who didn't tell Josh, but he was actually a Park-to-Park 2-fer contact from US-6979 and US-6980 in Rhode IslandJosh was now off to Burr Oak State Park, US-1939, and the North Country National Scenic Trail, US-4239. His next contact was also at 1548 UTC with KQ4GRB from Georgia. A few minutes later, KD2YGU called from New York, then KK4MOZ a minute later from North Carolina. Much like before, after a slow start, Josh started a small run of contacts with W1FRX, W8KAR, W0CGC, KZ4DT, KO4LMK, AD2CD, and AC4KW. He then packed everything up loosly in the front seat of the car for easy deployment at his last stop on his rove, Wallace H. O'Dowd State Wildlife Area, US-9514.

Overall, Josh made 11 QSOs, 1 of them being Park-to-Park, in 9 minutes of operating time. All his QSOs were single-sideband and made with 50 watts of output power.