ARS BumbleBee Contest July
25, 1999
Near Conifer, Colorado
Latitude 39 Degree 31Minute North
Longitude 105 Degree 30 Minute West
July 25, 1999
View
Log - Log of all contacts made
View QSLs Received -
Images of all QSL cards received
My original plan for the Bumblebee
sprint was to operate from South Dakota with good friend WU0H.
When he ended up having to work that weekend I was on my
own. There is a huge granite outcropping just a couple
miles from my house. I'd always wanted to operate there and
it looked like this was the time. Since it is only two
miles away it was a short hike, but since it was basically a huge
granite boulder, that last few feet of the hike were pretty much
straight up. 
When I got to the top, I was
surprised at the ruggedness. Basically, a 5 foot by 35 foot
boulder field. The two long sides were sheer dropoffs of 75
to 150 feet. There were, however, some beautiful views.
The picture to the right is the view to the east (note
the radial wire running over the rock).
This is the view to the
west.
To
the south.....
And finally.... to the North
When I arrived at the top I didn't know for
sure if I was going to be able to get an antenna up amongst all
the boulders. My antenna is a vertical made from a 20'
fishing pole. The radiator is a piece of TV twin lead with
one element cut for 20 meters and the other cut for 15 meters.
I usually attach the fishing pole to a handy dead limb.
Up here there were no handy dead limbs. I usually
spread the 20 & 15 meter radials about 15 foot from the base
at a 45 degree angle and use them to guy the antenna. Up
here there was no room spread radials. I carefully eyed the
flat ground 100 feet below me thinking how easy my antenna would
go up but the appeal of an antenna on top of a 150' rock tower
was too much and I went to work I got the pole up and
wedged it between two handy boulders, wrapping several miles of
string around the boulders and the pole to get it to stay put.
That done, I very cautiously climbed up and down boulders,
hanging wire radials over cliffs or tying to anything I could
wrap a string around. Definitely nothing scientific 
about this antenna configuration. All I wanted
was an erect antenna and a low enough swr that my sierra would
put a load into the antenna. I figured my 150' tower would
take care of the rest. I got the antenna up about 25
minutes before the contest began. Five minutes later I had
the sierra hooked to the antenna and battery, the bulldog
paddle and radio shack mini headphones hooked to the sierra
and I was ready to test. With the strange radial
configuration I was using I was anxious as I loaded her up and
checked the swr. Viola!!! SWR was almost flat on both
15 & 20. I immediately launched into a pre-contest qso
with W8VQ, Len in Columbus, OH confirming that I could
communicate! At 11:00 MST I was on the air in the
Bumblebee. It seemed that my 150' rock tower theory worked
like a charm. I ended up with 69 qso's: 60 on 20 mtr and 9
on 15 mtr. Seemed like I was getting excellent reports from
everyone. My only concern was that it seemed my 150' rock
tower was boosting my xmit signal more then my rcvd signals.
It seemed like many times I would hear a very, very faint
signal answer my CQ but not be able to dig the call out for the
QSO. After the contest was over, I wrapped up with a very
nice little rag chew with N0HJ, John near San Rafael, CA whom I
had worked on both 15 & 20 during the contest. All in
all this was a very satisfying experience. The extra
challange of climbing the boulder and getting my antenna up in
the middle of that boulder 
field make the
whole thing a little more worth while. I might have started
a whole new hobby of operating from challenging places.
Speaking of difficult places, note the operating position at
right. I was squatted in behind a boulder, legs nearly
dangling off the edge of one of the aforementioned 100' drop
offs. Anyway.... had a great time, hope to see you next
year. 73, N0SXX - Gary Slagel