Association: Wales
Region: South Wales
Latitude: 51 51 46 N,
Longitude: 3 3 30 W
Grid Reference: SO 272188,
QTH Locator: IO81LU
Next stop after Coity Mountain was Sugar Loaf. It rained quite heavily on the way to Sugar Loaf, but the sun was once again shining as arrived at the car park, although there were plenty of big rain clouds around. I set off on the walk towards the distant summit.
I met only 4 other people descending and a women out exercising her horse.The
sun was shining down over Abergavenny and I was hopeful of a dry
activation. The summit itself is fairly narrow with very little room for HF antennas. Luckily it looked
like I'd have the place to myself so used the trig point to lash the
pole . There were very few other positions to mount it so this would be a
problem if you were to visit on a busy weekend. My CQ was rapidly answered by the hoards just as te snow started to fall in earnest. 10 Minutes into the activation and I'm in a complete white out as the snow and clouds roll in and surround me. The crashes in my headphones left me a bit uneasy sitting up 600 metres in the clouds. Feeling a bit uncomfortable with the whole thing I decided to call it quits and get out whilst the going was good, unfortunately leaving a whole pack of chasers without a QSO. So only 16 QSOs and 7 DXCC this time around.. I packed up in the blizzard and no sooner had I done so than the clouds parted, the sun came out and everything looked calm and peaceful again! I was tempted to set up again and give the chasers their points, but with a long hike back, the day drawing on and an hour and a half drive home I just put on my back pack and started the descent. So that's the winter bonus period over, we'll be back on these 2 pointers next season!
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| Sugar Loaf in the distance. |
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| Sunshine over Abergavenny. |
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| Antenna up and the snow arriving |
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| Ready to go |
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| The snow arrives. |
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