Even in January, Hawksbill attracts a lot of visitors. On the way up to the summit I passed a women who had set up a hammock 3′ off the trail. Considering all the space available to hang, this seemed like a strange place to set up a hammock. The summit consists of a day use shelter, observation platform and an open viewpoint. Along with SOTA, I have activated from here before for the ARRL January VHF contest. The observation platform makes a nice spot for 2m simplex operation.

This time however, I decided to operate VHF from the viewpoint. I managed to work my friend Jay( NS4J) which was great to get him in the log. For HF I walked back about 25 yards past the shelter to a wooded area where I had a nice spot to hang an antenna. I did have issues getting my antenna up in the trees and had to resort to using my shortening technique to be able to get the antenna to fit in the smaller space. Once that happened, I got on 40 meters and worked a nice pile up. Lately 40 meters has been more consistent and productive than any band which is interesting since in the past I haven’t been a big fan of the band.

On the Air: