Sota Activation – VK3/VW-022 Mt Arapiles 2015

We are visiting Chrsitines parents for easter, they live in horsham in western Victoria, i was able to sneak out for a couple of hours to play and make a Sota Activation. I asked the family if they wanted to come, but they all voted to stay home. Mt Arapiles is around 30km west of…

Sota Activations – New Years 2015.

Sota rules allow one summit activation (for the activator points) per calendar year, and the program runs to UTC time. In Australia we are lucky that we are 10(11)hrs in front of the UTC date line, our new years eve change over is 11am normal people time! SO.. I lined up the family for the…

Sota Activation – VK3/VC-031 Arthurs Seat

I headed down the Mornington peninsular the other day with a job and managed to fit in a short activation on Arthurs Seat VK3/VC-031in the afternoon before heading home. The summit is very accessible, and I drove to the top, then grabbed my gear and walked down the Arthurs seat circuit walking track path, past…

Shack Sloth Trophy

A couple of weeks ago, I was successful in achieving 1000 sota chaser points and became a Shack Sloth. The SOTA organisation in the UK makes available trophy for those who qualify, and I sent off and received this Shack Sloth Glass trophy in the mail yesterday! Now to get to more summits and get…

Sota Activation – Mt Alexander VK3/VN-016

The other day, I had to head to Bendigo for work, so packed the SOTA gear in the car for a quick late afternoon activation on the way home. Mt Alexander VK3/VN-016 sits just south of Bendigo and has the local TV and FM transmitters sites on the top of it, also a tower form…

Sota Activation – VK3/VC-022 Mt Cowley 2014

Work took me back to western Victoria yesterday, with an early morning meeting in Warrnambool which meant a very early morning trip form Melbourne. Having finished all my tasks by mid-day, I took the opportunity to undertake some RF survey works taking the coast road back to Melbourne, looking at some site options for some…

Sota Activation – VK1/AC-040 Mt Ainslie

As part of a short family holiday to Sydney and home via Canberra, I was able to fit in one activation. I had dropped the family off at Questacon early on good friday morning, the kids love this place, we spent a whole day at the science centre on wednesday, and they wanted to go back.…

SOTA = Summits of the ANDREW

One observation of this Sota caper is. Many of the operators are named Andrew. Is it just a case of age/naming popularity of the 1960’s and 1970’s? Or some other weird universe / moon / crystal / alignment that has drawn so many Andrews to climb to the top of hills and call out as…