Summer fun and plenty of DX

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Well it has been a busy few weeks as we enjoy our summer holiday, we have been to many places from beautiful riverside walks, moor tops, coastal beach walking and beyond. Some of the places I was at included ham radio and I have been busy with my mobile and portable operation's. 

The mobile HAM Radio station is still the same old original YAESU FT-857 and Maldol mobile mono band antenna's. This still works awesome as ever despite been 20 years in service. I have been making quite a few FM 2M mobile contacts recently as well and that has been pretty cool as well as providing impressive performance with my second antenna that is permanently mounted on the van roof. It is a Diamond dual band VHF UHF antenna. I have also had that one years as well 😀. 

Whilst in Scotland (last week) I had plenty of time to work portable and we also had electric hook up on the beach side camp at Port William. This allowed me to set up my 50amp PSU which I used to power the fridge as well as my very old first HF radio that I bought.
 Yes it is my YAESU FT-890 which is still a great radio to operate. 
I had it nice in our Van Awning right at the side of the Irish Sea on the West coast in S.W Scotland. My van was used as the ground plane and  antenna base which I connected a second length of coaxial feed line to the van mount straight into the radio in the awning. I also got out my big Hustler antenna and tried out both the RM-20 and RM-40 resonators (20m and 40m band). 
The FT-890 and Hustlers worked fabulous /p as I operated as MM0YKS/P. I made some great DX into Indonesia, USA, South America and The West Indies whilst /P and /M. It was lots of fun and also confused as few lol as my call changed to MM0 from my usual M0.
The week before that we were over at the East Yorkshire Coast
we stayed at a converted farm house near to the sea which again was great for radio in between the family fun and sand castles.
My latest enjoyment mission was yesterday when we visited Yorkshire Air Museum and spent the afternoon admiring the amazing aircraft on display. A good place to visit if you are up in Yorkshire. 
The weeks off have been busy but we have done a lot of good things and made every day count no matter what the weather has had to offer. I have walked miles lol 😅. 
A few more things to enjoy before a brand new year of teaching begins again. One of those is my YAESU FTDX-101MP which I am getting in with very well indeed. This morning I was into the South Cook Islands for the second time this year. I also have had some amazing contacts worldwide as we enjoy the solar activity of cycle 25. Some recent favourite DX include China, Japan, Peru and even Pakistan and Iran. There are too many to mention but it is very good to hear so much DX and to be able to work them. 
thanks for reading this blog and following my ham Radio adventures. I will be listening out on HF and the Satellite bands and hopefully back with you live from the the shack on another livestream this Sunday around about 21.00 UTC 22.00 local. 
Here is something to keep you busy until then. Best 73 to all.



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