Been over a year and things have changed since then. I hadn't been active with SOTA for sometime. I hadn't even done all that much hiking in general. Last fall my wife Donna aka XYL KB0JOK went into the hospital for back surgery. Long story-short, after being in the hospital for 3 months, she passed away. I visited the various hospitals and care facilities at least once a day. With a full time job, it didn't leave much time to do much. In March/April I joined back with a hiking club I belong too and got active again. Then it turned hot. After watching my weight go back up, it was time to get active again.
The Arizona association (W7A) of SOTA changed since my last post. Instead of 119 summits and a couple of activators, it is now close to 2500 summits and many active activators and chasers. SOTA has really taken off in AZ!
On Sunday September 1, 2013 I drove to Cave Creek, AZ to activate Black Mountain. This is a 3397 foot mountain with a trail head elevation of 2195 feet. Point value is 4pts. At the summit on this day were hundreds if not thousands of gnats. Luckily they were only at the summit. I dropped back down 20 ft or so and they never bothered me there. So I setup after letting know the local chasers that I had arrived and was setting up.
From the summit, one had 360 degree views of the Valley of the Sun.
Looking East/NNE. In the lower left corner you can see my Black Widow pole.
To top off the summit activation was a S2S (Summit to Summit) with WA7JTM on 40M.
With enough contacts in the log, back down the hill I went.
Thanks for the contacts!
more pictures here
until another summit...73 de Jon N7AZ
2M
N7AMA
W7RV
20M
W7RV
KA7CVJ
W7USA
N7AMA
W5ODS
N1EU
W0MNA
N5XL
40M
N5XL
20M
NS7P
17M
N5XL
20M
K3XD
AE4FZ
WB0PTD
40M S2S
WA7JTM
73 Jon N7AZ
