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I remember a conversation way back when I was on the D68C expedition to the Comoros islands in the Indian Ocean. John G3WGV and Mark M0DXR were talking about the pleasure that people get from making contacts with DXpeditions. Mark summarised it in a way that I’ve always remembered, “for each QSO we make, we’re making someone happy”. It’s a magical way of looking at it and it would be nice to think that it is true.

I was reminded of this reading Dave Richards’ AA7EE’s blog about his QSO with T32C on 80m with a homebrew QRP and a 40m dipole! It’s a great story but what makes it even better is that the operator from T32C, Franky, ON7RU read the blog and commented on it! What really makes it is Dave’s clear surprise and pleasure at making the QSO.

Having operated a few DXpeditions over the years, I can safely say that it’s stories like these that make it all the more enjoyable. I remember back at 3B9C, I randomly strolled over to a spare station which was free and put out a call on 10m FM on 29.600MHz. A fair few came back and I worked my way through. Soon, I heard a familiar voice calling me, MW0TTU.

Mo, MW0TTU is the aunt of my friend Kelvin, GW4TTU and we had worked many a time on VHF from the South Wales hills. Simply, I replied without callsigns, “Hello Mo, what a lovely surprise, you’re five and nine in Rodrigues”.

It was lovely to hear Mo’s surprised voice as she said “Who’s that? Who’s that!”. Of course I explained quickly and did the more formal exchange of reports and then got back to the pileup, but it was a magical exchange.

It’s the QSOs like that that really surprise people and make them happy.

When I lived in Canada, I regularly bought a copy of CQ-VHF magazine. Edited by Joe N6CL, it’s an accessible, enthusiastic and informative look at the VHF/UHF scene.

When I moved back to the UK I occasionally looked at subscribing, but the costs to ship it to the UK were pretty high. I happened to look again the other day and was delighted to see that I could subscribe to the magazine as a digital download for a very reasonable $18.

The Fall 2011 issue should be available this week and I am looking forward to browsing it on my iPad!

Well, of course it never really went away. Over the last few weeks and days, I’ve hearing people talking about what they’ve been working on 10m FM. Occasionally when I’ve been in the shack I’ve put the rig on 29.600MHz FM and have heard a good few stations coming through. Many people have reported making QSOs through a US repeater (New York?) on 29.620MHz. This evening, coming home, I drove outside the car park, under the low barrier and put the Comet UHV-6 antenna on the car ( it’s too tall to fit under the barrier). As I drove home, I tuned around 10m FM. Fascinating!The most distant station was, and I think I have the call correct, was KF7EZ/M in 7 land! He was looking for a friend of his in the US 4 call area! I tried to call him and let him know he was being heard in the UK. Also heard VA3QRM, a W2 in New Jersey and W5AF (I think- I wasn’t writing calls down!). Not entirely sure how well the UHV-6 works on 10m FM. Fascinating listening and I’ll repeat the exercise tomorrow. Hopefully I will make a QSO before long. And in the meantime, I must remember to take the big antenna off the car before I head in tomorrow morning!

The T32C Dxpedition to Chrismas Island (T3) has been going for a little while now. What with one thing and another, as well as poor conditions, I haven’t really listened very much. Having said that, I’ve been in regular e-mail contact with some of the team which has been good fun. They are doing a great job and are amassing a huge QSO total; over 170,000 QSOs at the time of writing. Neville, G3NUG will be delighted!

I popped up to the shack briefly last night around 20:30z – mostly to have a look at VHF/UHF as conditions had seemed reasonable on the way home. Just out of curiosity, I had a look at the most recent T32C cluster spots. There were a few on 24MHz from Europe from a bit earlier, so I quickly tuned the FT1000MP to have a look. To my great surprise I could just hear them.

After a couple of minutes, the signals came up a little and I could hear that they were listening up 1. Nothing ventured, nothing gained! Dropped my call in a couple of times and was completely surprised when they came back with my call!

What a great surprise. This morning, I’m pleased to see my callsign in the online log.

I may look a little earlier, if I have the chance, on 28MHz. That’s a handy opening over Central and South America in the evenings. Over the years, I’ve worked ZL7, ZL9 and now T32 on 24 or 28MHz around that time.

On Friday evening I was just heading up to bed and I did my usual check on VHF/UHF to see what was happening. The FM box stopped on 145.7375. The normal station there is GB3AL but the station I could hear seemed to be in France – or at least the stations using the repeaters were. Signals were fairly weak but seemed to be fading up and down. I kept listening and the box identified; F1ZPL. A quick Google search and I was amazed. The repeater is in JN24WB – over 500 miles from me!