Memoranda

PoppyLine 50 mile walk 2008

 

If ever an event could be a true exercise then this event has it all – the opportunity of short, long, relief points/multiple coms points  . . . oh and this year it also had a variety of weather thrown in for good measure. - Sunshine, high winds, torrential rains, a 20 hour day, lost walker, difficult coms!! In some ways it was what Raynet is all about, but without an unknown outcome.

 

The morning started well enough, leaving home at 0700 so that we could get control up and running by0800 – fortunately Sheringham Youth Centre allows us to cheat a bit and the pump-up mast was able to sit on top of the fire exit some 5 metres or so above the ground, which meant we gained that much height + the metal building then gave us a good ground plane too. G4PSH, then topped it off by grabbing a FT8900R off his controller and sat indoors running 50 Watts for the rest of the day as G7RNN/P on 144.675MHz.

 

First CP (09.00) was at Runton Carpark, a mere skip down the coast and M0CNP was soon in control there, being able to work control on his hand held!

 

Next stop was South Repps Village Hall (10.15)where G0SMS was just able to work control, when the car was just in the right position in the carpark and the wind wasn’t blowing too strongly against the signal. The provision of a 5 metre mast and “slim-jim” on the top improved contacts with control and also gave a very good signal to CPs 3 and 4 (Bacton and Briggate respectively). It was here that the first “lost” runner started to delay the day’s proceedings – amusingly the runner’s number was 118 . . .

 

CP3 (11.30) was manned by 2E0ILH, who came well prepared with waterproofs and a tea making machine in the boot, but found that by placing his car in the right place he had no trouble working Sheringham with just a mag mount on his car’s roof . . . and it wasn’t even a tall/big car!! After finishing at Bacton, Ian then had to leapfrog to near Blickling Hall to be ready at CP6 (16.00) for the start of the night shifts, amongst the dark and scary trees and the big puddles (by then). Although he was able to work Sheringham still on the Mag mount from this point, Ian did experiment (in best amateur tradition) with a rope in a tree and a co-linear slung underneath.

 

Briggate, CP4 (13.00) provided an interesting coms point, once again it really did depend where in the carpark you were parked for contacting control.  2E0DJR soon had a mast up, and then down and then up and then down and then the car moved and the mast up for working control. G0SMS, by now on the way home, dropped off the mast and aerial, which although not used here was later used at Sheringham. After closing down at Briggate, Julian then jumped to the final CP at Hanworth Memorial Hall (17.30) and a beautiful sunny evening with lovely views over the green, until it got dark . . . CP7 finally closed around 03.00 hours on the Sunday morning . . .

 

It was quite interesting at CP5 (14.25), where the walk coincided with a football match and the start of some torrential rain . . . at least G7IJD was dry in his mobile home parked up in the front of Felmingham Village Hall and some of the walkers were starting to wonder how I was always at the CP in front of them, not out of breath and neither wet nor muddy . . . I had to admit it to them, I was just a smooth operator . . .

 

At 20.00 hours, in Sheringham, we switched controllers, aerials and transceivers as M1CQS took over the night shift, and G4PSH and myself after taking down the pump up aerial and putting the 5 metre alli pole and slim-jim up slowly wandered off home, both of us being able to work the lower mast station from as far away as Stalham mobile and easily from our base stations, though the outlying CPs could not be heard. It goes to show that with a good mast that Raynet can provide good simplex coms across North Norfolk and certainly to Silver command locations on 2m.

 

As already stated, Raynet’s involvement came to an end around 0300 on the Sunday morning with the closing of control and CP7.

 

My personal thanks go out to M0CNP, G0SMS, 2E0ILH, 2E0DJR, G7IJD, M1CQS and G4PSH without whom we wouldn’t have been able to cover this event, to 2E0DJR, 2E0ILH and M1CQS who worked the dark hours, to 2E0DJR and 2E0ILH in particular who stayed on station for some very long hours indeed.

 

 

Steve, G7VAH, North Norfolk Controller

(who seemed to spend all his time moving from CP to CP and trying to avoid flooded roads in particular between CP6 and CP7!!)

 

 

 

To all of you reading this, we still have 1 event left at time of writing – at Holkam Hall – it really is worth turning out for all or part of these exercises as it is only in the “field” that you find out if your equipment works, your battery doesn’t go flat and you get practical experience of a “real thing”, complete with the long sessions of doing nothing!!

 

If we get another storm surge this winter are you ready?? Have you checked your equipment?? Can you go at short notice, or be able to relieve another member during a long call out???