Sonoran Desert CWT

For a brief respite from winter this year, I flew down to Tucson, rented a car, and drove a couple hours west to Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument. It's one of the only pieces of public land I know of in the Southwest with good camping and hiking, and at low enough elevation to be comfortable in December. The campground is just a few miles from the Mexican border.  Typical daytime temperatures were around 20 C (68 F), going down to around 5 C (40 F) at night. Not exactly tropical, but a lot warmer than Wisconsin this time of year. It's very uncrowded, as the crowds don't arrive until after Christmas.

  

I arrived at dusk Tuesday night and found a nice campsite with a shelter. The shelter turned out to be really handy a couple days later.

Campsite, Mexican Mountains

I was planning to be there on two Wednesdays, so I brought along the KX2, 11 meter fishing pole, the end fed 40 meter half wave, and the rest of the bicycle portable gear. I skipped the 13Z session, as that would have meant setting up in the dark, but the antenna was up in plenty of time for the 19Z session.

Fishing Pole Antenna Support

This time the antenna was set up in the open, rather than in the bottom of a canyon, so I was hoping for better results than on my last western trip.  The RBN reports looked pretty good before 19Z on both 20 and 40.  However, when the fun started, things were pretty slow on 20. I stayed there until about 1940, then spent the last 20 minutes making just 5 contacts on 40. I think the antenna was working well, but I just wasn't strong enough to get through to the east coast, and most of the western stations stayed on 20. The end result was a mere 33 QSO's and 32 mults.

The 03Z session wasn't much better. 40 wasn't bad, but when things slowed down after 25 contacts, I went to 80. My 40 meter half wave wire is, of course, a quarter wave on 80, so I added two quarter wave radials. It works, but not all that well. 10 excellent pairs of ears added another 10 contacts, for a total of 35, with 32 mults.

Taking the antenna down in the dark is always a hassle, but miraculously nothing got tangled in the cacti.

That was the end of radio operations for a week. There was some "interesting" weather, but it cleared up and I did some great hikes. I had plenty of time to practice the oboe, work on reeds, and just relax. For those interested in the non-radio story, see this blog:

Organ Pipe National Monument 2018

Storm in the Desert

Desert Sunset

My last day was another Wednesday, so I set up the radio station one more time. Rather than risk taking down the antenna in the dark again, I decided to only do the 19Z session. This time I set up a sun shade to make it a little easier to see the displays. I hadn't brought the laptop, so I had to log on paper. However, since I had cellular data service, it occurred to me to watch the RBN reports on the iPad in hopes of making a few more QSO's. I think it helped. Things were going pretty well on 20 so, recalling the previous week's dismal result on 40, I just stayed on 20. There must have been some Es around, as I made quite a few west coast QSO's, in addition to those further away to the east. I ended up with 49 QSO's and mults, my best desert portable score so far. And that includes the Death Valley operation 2 years ago with 100 W.

Operating Position

Fishing Pole Back Up

With Sun Shade

Thus ends another desert CWT diversion. With plenty of time on my hands, it definitely was worthwhile bringing the radio gear. Though I wasn't traveling by bicycle, the fishing pole and KX2 sure made packing for air travel easy, especially with all the camping and oboe gear.

The last morning, I packed everything up, gave the rest of my stove fuel to some other campers, and drove back to Tucson in plenty of time to catch my 2:45 flight. Back to winter!