From Parks to Peaks: How SOTA Differs from POTA

Ever wondered what happens when you combine hiking, mountaineering, and ham radio? That's exactly what Summits on the Air (SOTA) is all about! In this episode, we step away from our usual Parks on the Air discussions to explore the thrilling world of mountaintop radio operations with two accomplished SOTA enthusiasts.

Meet Matt W7MDN, a pilot from Spokane who combines trail running and snowshoeing with radio, and Tim N7KOM, a mountaineer and YouTube creator from Bend who's known for his ultralight setups. Both have achieved the prestigious Mountain Goat award, representing 1,000 activation points earned by operating from mountain summits.

We unpack the fundamental differences between POTA and SOTA – while parks often allow drive-up operations with 100-watt rigs, SOTA requires reaching designated activation zones near peaks with equipment disconnected from vehicles. The equipment philosophy shifts dramatically too, with most SOTA operators using 5-10 watt radios like the MTR3 or Elecraft KX2, paired with lightweight wire antennas that can be quickly deployed.

The conversation dives into the meticulous planning required for SOTA activations, from researching access permissions to preparing for safety contingencies. Matt and Tim share their favorite activation stories, including Matt's Mountain Goat qualification during a January snowshoe expedition and Tim's sunrise celebration atop Mount McLaughlin complete with ceremonial goat horns.

Whether you're an experienced operator looking for a new challenge or simply curious about combining outdoor adventure with radio, this episode provides a comprehensive introduction to SOTA. You'll learn about the points system, equipment recommendations, online resources, and the thriving community that makes this radio sport so rewarding.

Ready to climb a mountain with your radio? This might just be the inspiration you need to earn those summit points and breathtaking views!

Short show intro audio clip

Short outro audio clip

The Everyday Ham Podcast is hosted by James Mills (K8JKU), Jim Davis (N8JRD), and Rory Locke (W8KNX) – three friends who dive into the world of amateur radio with a casual, lighthearted twist.

Follow us at: Website: https://www.everydayham.com/

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/everydayhampodcast/

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
All right, everyone, welcome to the Everyday Ham.
I am James, joined by Rory andJim.
Today we're diving intosomething a little bit different
than our normal Parks on theAir or POTA discussions.
We're kind of heading to themountains to explore summits on
the air or soda, which, for Jim,rory and myself, is something
new.
So you'll notice we are joinedby two new guests.
Today we have Matt W7MDN fromSpokane, washington.

(00:25):
Matt is both a military andcommercial pilot who picked up
ham radio during the COVID years, much like myself, and since
has combined his love of trailrunning, mountain biking and
even snowshoeing with the hobby.
Earlier this year Matt reacheda major milestone by earning a
Mountain Goat Award, which we'llprobably learn is a really big
deal here shortly.
We're also joined by Timand7KOM from Bend, oregon.

(00:47):
Tim is a mountaineer, skier andcyclist and shares his
adventures with thousands ofYouTubers on his YouTube channel
.
So, tim, tell me if I get thiswrong.
It's N7KOM Mountaintop PortableRadio.

Speaker 3 (00:58):
Hopefully that's correct, that's right.
All right, good All right.

Speaker 1 (01:01):
You're known for your ultralight setups I saw in some
of your bios summit to summitcontacts and a big advocate for
soda Also I confirmed thisbefore we started recording.
You also have a Mountain GoatAward that you earned last year
at the Oregon Campout as well.
So thank you, tim and Matt, forcoming in and joining us to
kind of learn about soda.
Yeah, thanks for having us.

(01:22):
So why don't you guys talk alittle bit about?
Why did you start?
So what's your?
What's your backgrounds?
We talked to you were bothCOVID hams.
I believe that's when youstarted to get your license.
So what brought you to the,this great hobby?

Speaker 4 (01:35):
I didn't have any formal electronics background
but I think, like a lot of kidsin the 80s, we have one or two
guys on our street that hadthese weird looking antennas in
their backyards with big, hugerotators.
And I went and knocked on thedoor, you know, one day, and got
to meet this guy and took meinto his ham shack and, um, he
eventually ended up giving me aloan of radio, just as a listing
.
It was kind of um, but it wasimmediately dissuaded at that

(01:57):
age from the, the five word perminute code thing.
I was like, oh boy, I'm, I'm,you know it.
Just it wasn't going to happen,I wasn't wasn't ready for it.
So, um, anyway, fast forward.
I had always wanted to to getmy amateur radio license.
Um, I had heard they haddropped the code requirement but
just never really had the timeto pursue it.
And then here, just in the lastuh, five years or so, I was out

(02:19):
with a buddy of mine who I wasstationed with a mountain bike
and he was telling me about thisthing called someone's on the
air and I thought, wow, thatsounds right up my alley.
So we're, it's stuff out, it'soutdoor, kind of stuff going to
the top of mountains and youtake these little radios and
communicate to people and justit was like wow, I had no idea
that there was anything likethat.
So that that immediately wasthe impetus for technician,

(02:41):
quickly followed by general andextra and and uh, it's been.
It's been a blast.
To this day I I don't have ahome qth, I do a lot of um
practice online with cw andthings like that um, but it has,
it's been a blast.
It's opened a lot of doors andI've seen parts of the northwest
I never would have would haveseen otherwise yeah that's

(03:02):
pretty cool tim tim, what aboutyourself?

Speaker 1 (03:04):
What got you?

Speaker 3 (03:06):
Yeah, similar entry in that it was a COVID hobby
Picked it up figuring it wouldbe good to have in the outdoors
because I was doing a lot ofmountaineering and especially
during COVID solo hiking,because we just didn't know what
the right precautions were atthe time.
It kind of checked into a fewnets.
Nets was like, okay, I mightjust leave this in my emergency

(03:27):
kit like the earthquake kit andnot really get into it.
But I was on qrzcom and I sawone of Charlie Charlie's videos,
nj7v, red Summit, rf, and thetitle of the video was something
like I rack up soda pointswhile you're sleeping or
something, and it was like sodapoints, what's that.

(03:58):
Sounds like a challenge as well.
Just clicked and, yeah, I wentand did my first soda activation
shortly after that and and itwas just a slippery slope and I
was hooked and now it's mypersonality.

Speaker 2 (04:13):
The pictures that you guys post, I'll just say this
uh are much more picturesquethan the things that I see from
the poda folks.
There are some excellent podapictures, but, uh, the soda, the
soda pictures are second tonone, gentlemen.
So I'll tell you, if nothingelse, you're getting out there
and seeing some really coolspots up on the top of all of
these summits out there.
I just looked up Red Summit RF2, and if anybody's listening out

(04:33):
there, that's worth a look.
It looks like he's out andabout quite frequently doing
soda activations and travelingas well.
So very, very cool as well.

Speaker 3 (04:43):
So very, very cool yeah and so kind of, as James
mentioned, really like thelightweight portable setups.
And after getting skunked acouple of times doing some two
meter FM activations, startingto get out of the Portland metro
area, then I realized I need toget my general license and then
after that got the extrabecause it was COVID times and

(05:04):
lots of free time on the handsBecause why not?

Speaker 1 (05:06):
That's exactly what I did too.
Yep, yeah.

Speaker 3 (05:09):
Then I don't have to worry about that pesky band plan
Right, Exactly See maybe that'swhere.

Speaker 5 (05:13):
That's where I screwed up during COVID is I was
busy studying for my realestate license.
I should have been studying formy my extra class license
during COVID.
That that was my mistake.
Now, now it's to be seen if Iever even do it.

Speaker 2 (05:26):
Oh, you'll do it, you'll get it eventually, yeah
you'll do it.

Speaker 5 (05:28):
Yeah, it's worth it, I will.

Speaker 3 (05:30):
But yeah, at this point I run a remote station
from my QTH for the CascadiaRadio Discord.
It's an inclusive ham communityup in the Pacific Northwest and
I'm all about like this is,let's be honest, this is kind of
an expensive hobby to get into.
So I'm really trying toincrease accessibility to this

(05:51):
and we're a club that's not aclub sort of thing, but I want
people who don't have a QTH tobe able to get on the air.

Speaker 2 (06:00):
If they would like to .
It's really cool.
Is it cascadiaradioorg?
Am I looking at the correctsite there?

Speaker 3 (06:06):
Yeah, that's right, very cool and people outside the
PNW can join as well.
It's just kind of focused there.

Speaker 2 (06:14):
Tell me a little bit about.
I'm going to sidetrack thisalready, James.
I'm so sorry.
You brought up remote radio.

Speaker 3 (06:25):
Talk a little bit about what you got set up for
remote radio, because I'm alwaysinterested.
Yeah, so.
So my qth, the antenna, is a fandipole 10 through 40 meters and
that goes to ic, which has avery convenient usb port and
sound card.
So it's it runs right from thatto a little mini pc that runs
on uh 12 volts and uh yeah, andthat's uh kind of always on.
As far as the softwareconcerned, it's windows 11, so

(06:47):
it runs rc forb, whichunfortunately that excludes
anyone on ios or uh or uh apple,because it is android and
windows only at the moment.
But it is free software and Idon't have a big budget to buy
one of the other remote softwareopportunity or options out

(07:09):
there.
But it's a way to get morepeople on the air and to be a
little selfish.
You know, when I'm outtraveling and I see someone pop
up on a soda summit, I can chasethem from my phone.
So that's a lot of fun too.

Speaker 2 (07:23):
Very interesting.
Yeah, I always like I say it'scurious and what an excellent
opportunity, like you said, forfolks that maybe don't know if
they're ready to make a purchaselike that yet, to get on the
radio, to play with it a littlebit and get to use it and see
what they think, and also, likeyou said, it's accessible to you
as well, self-servingly, whenyou want to grab a summit or
something or a poda or whateverelse you're doing.

(07:43):
So very cool.
Awesome to hear about that.
Matt, you said you didn't haveany radios at the QTH, so a lot
of out on the mountainexperience, it sounds like.
As far as that's concerned, Iguess I'm going to ask the
hardware question to you as well.
What is your current favoriterig to take out on your soda
missions?

Speaker 4 (08:01):
Oh man, I just got the new version of the mtr3, the
kuriki version, and I love that, um, and so I I didn't get in
in time when they wereoriginally making the l and r
precision mtr radio.
I don't have it handy, it's.
It's literally about this biglike deck of cards, five watts

(08:22):
cw.
Tim's gonna, tim's got hisclose by.
It looks like, um, they'reawesome little radios and so for
soda, where ultralight iseverything.
Uh, I've been using that quitea bit.
Yeah, oh gosh, yeah, they're,they're just amazing.
So that's my current rig dujour and yep thing is it is cool
, that's really awesome.
Um, that's just.

(08:42):
You know, it's a CWL on radio,so obviously that eliminates the
SSB opportunities there.
I have a TX500, the Lab 599CX500.
I like that one quite a bit aswell and kind of like Tim was
talking about there a minute ago, a lot of the ultralight.
There's quite a following inSOTA for the ultralight
do-it-yourself antennas andpaddles and things like that

(09:04):
there are there.
It's really neat, I would say,probably more so than parks on
the air.
But what limit?
What little I know about parksin the air.
Um, because we're so weight andspace conscious there we're
always looking for the smallest,next best thing and and there's
been a lot of that a lot ofinnovation.
There's a couple of guys thatare constantly coming up with

(09:24):
new things in SOTA that are justreally cool and that's, you
know, that kind of has gotten meinto, you know, soldering and
building things that I neverimagined I'd be doing.
You know, out in the garagethey're kind of trying to solder
stuff, so it's kind of cool.
But anyway, to answer yourquestion, and I've got a couple
of other radios, we've got aL-Craft Kicks and a couple of
HTs that I use, but that, youknow, the biggest radio I have

(09:46):
is pushing 10 watts and that, Iwould say, is pretty standard
for something that's on the airfor the most part.

Speaker 2 (09:55):
You see a lot of guys kind of in that 5 to 10 watt
range.
Yeah, okay, that makes sense,and we were talking about this
as kind of show house here.
It's all poda right, and we'reoften running 100 watts with the
biggest and heaviest antenna wecan drag out into the field.

Speaker 1 (10:13):
It's kind of lavish in comparison to soda.
It sounds like it's like theglamping version of soda.
Yeah, I was just going to say.

Speaker 2 (10:17):
So it sounds fun to hear some equipment that hadn't
even crossed my mind because itwouldn't really be probably
effective in a lot of the podoparks.
Right Given where you are, youget height, so you've got that
extra might, as we always jokein ham right.
So five Watts goes a lotfurther for you guys up on the
summits.

Speaker 1 (10:35):
All right, let's set a baseline real quick too, of
explain, because we're talking alot about soda and there are
maybe some people out there thatare not soda experts.
I'm going to put myself in thatcamp, kind of give us the
elevator pitch of what isSummits on the Air Stim you want
to?

Speaker 4 (10:47):
try it.
You want to go first on thatone.

Speaker 3 (10:50):
I'm trying to think of something pithy and I can't.

Speaker 1 (10:52):
So I'm just going to say it's all right.

Speaker 3 (10:54):
It's hooking uphill until you can't anymore and then
making radio contacts Okay.

Speaker 1 (11:00):
Okay, how many contacts do you need for it to
count as a?
Do you call it activations?

Speaker 3 (11:05):
Yeah, we call it activations as well, the people
we're making contacts with.
We call them chasers ratherthan hunters.
Hunters, yeah, same role.
You need four QSOs withdifferent people.
So if one person works you fourtimes on four different bands,
I don't think that counts, andMatt maybe, if you know I don't

(11:28):
think it counts either.
Yeah, four different QSOs to getthat.
And to kind of go back to thelow power thing.
I think that also kind of feedsinto why Morse code is so
popular with the SOTA activators.
It's because we're using theselow power radios most of the
time and I know on the EastCoast there's a lot more density

(11:52):
of hams so you can get awaywith low power poda.
But I'll be honest, it's prettychallenging out here in the
West.
I've been skunked a few timesdoing podOTAs with five watts
and not being able to get those10 contacts.

Speaker 1 (12:09):
What's the ratio of your HF versus, let's say, V8
UHF contacts?

Speaker 3 (12:14):
Can I share my screen ?

Speaker 1 (12:16):
Yeah, go ahead, you can share your screen.

Speaker 3 (12:17):
I don't know.
I'll see if I can, but I willsay just, while I'm bringing
this up, I'll see if I can, butI will say just while I'm
bringing this up.
The Oregon Summits on the Aircampout will wildly skew those
results Sure, because this Julywas our fourth year doing the
campout.
We had 60 hams that took overthis one campground for the

(12:41):
weekend and there's tons ofsummits nearby.
So in the morning morningeveryone just sort of disperses
out into the forest, up themountains, and then it is just
chaos on two meters and everyoneis getting summit to summit
contacts.
So I will have very skewedresults just thanks to that one
event, because there's just somuch two meter activity in this

(13:04):
one weekend.
Otherwise I'm you know, here inCentral Oregon we do have a ham
club, but it's kind of hit ormiss whether someone gets you on
two meters when you're out.

Speaker 5 (13:15):
It sounds very similar to the skewed statistics
that happened around CaesarCreek State Park during Dayton
Hamvention.

Speaker 1 (13:22):
That's what that sounds like to me All right, let
me see if I can share this justto, and Tim, while you're
pulling it out, maybe, matt, canyou explain to me too what is
considered sort of the you haveto be on the summit, correct,
like within a certain distanceof the peak you do.

Speaker 4 (13:37):
And it's.
I'm not looking at the rulesright now, but it's 25 meters or
82 feet roughly to be in theactivation zone and you want to
spend some time looking at that.
I've skunked myself a coupletimes setting up on what I
thought was the actualactivation zone and ended up not
being in it and having a badactivation.

Speaker 1 (13:58):
Oh yeah, yeah.
Sometimes I think it's hardenough trying to find in parks
on the air like wild game areasor game lands.

Speaker 5 (14:06):
Oh yeah, we're constantly discussing poda park
boundaries and what's legit andwhat's not.
So if you're having to keep itwithin a certain distance of the
peak, that adds definitelyanother layer of complication
there.

Speaker 2 (14:20):
Yeah, all right.
So looks like Tim maybe has theSotlotless.
Sotless is that the soda atlaspulled up here yeah, that that's
right.

Speaker 3 (14:29):
This is kind of the preferred uh mapping website for
summits on the air and I justwanted to bring up real quick
the activation zone that uh mattwas describing.
So it's kind of a rough contour.
Um, I think this is based off alidar data um for for this map
here.
But essentially you want to bein this zone and uh, the

(14:52):
reasoning behind it, this, thisuh game, this radio game started
, I think, in britain or europe,but uh, hill walking is very
popular and the idea was to givean area for the ham radio
operator to move away from thecrowds and not, you know,
disrupt anyone else's enjoymenton the summit.

(15:13):
So it gives you this zone tokind of play in.
The idea is you got to be inthis area for the activation to
count.
In this area for the activationto count, okay, and for the
folks that are listening.

Speaker 2 (15:24):
There's a well-identified green area on
the Soda Atlas that we'relooking at here visually and
that is the zone where folks aregoing to be targeting hiking
into with their ultralight gearthat Matt and Tim have both kind
of alluded to thus far.
So it is a far more challengingas far as that radio sport than

(15:45):
POTA.
Right, there are tough ones toget to in POTA, but it looks
like for SOTA especially.
None of these are things whereyou're going to drive up to the
parking lot and be in the zone.

Speaker 3 (15:55):
Well, that's not entirely true.

Speaker 2 (15:58):
Okay.

Speaker 3 (15:59):
So there are drive up summits, and here maybe I can
just stop sharing.
I'm guessing like tennesseeright or north carolina area,
probably more than here here inoregon there's there's spots
around, there's a lot of loggingroads you can drive up, but the
main rule is that your radiostation can't be attached to
your gas powered vehicle in anyway.

(16:20):
So you know you could drive upand walk 10, 15 feet away from
your truck or sedan or Prius,whatever made it up that road
and then set up your station andoperate off battery power I got
to, I got to call out bothJames and Rory.

Speaker 2 (16:35):
No ATOS 120.
Sorry guys, no, we would becompletely out.

Speaker 5 (16:39):
Both of us James and his Jeep Wrangler and me and my
Grand Cherokee wouldn't't.
Wouldn't be running our a test.
I am noticing, I'm looking atthis, this mapping site, and
you're talking.
It's funny, you're talkingabout drive up sites.
Not too far from you there,james, looks like northwest of
oxford.
There's a mount christyapparently that that's a thing
and it looks like uh, looks likea street will take you right

(17:16):
there, so maybe it's not so hard.

Speaker 4 (17:17):
that is our closest soda spot in our metro area.
It looks like I didn't knowthat was a issue and that is.
I don't know.
It may just be the area thatwe're in generally, but I find
myself buying a lot of timberpermits to access some of these
areas.
Going to the site that Rory'stalking about, usually if it's
been activated before, somebodywill put a write-up that says

(17:39):
you know, hey, there's privateproperty, no trespassing signs.
That is specifically talkedabout in the SODA rules.
That's not a valid activation,so that could be a limiter.
So you got to kind of do yourreconnaissance.
We're using some of thewebsites that you guys are
looking at now the one that Timbrought up a second ago and
there are ways to get to likeGaia, gps or Onyx or things like

(18:03):
that.
We'll tell you.

Speaker 2 (18:03):
I was going to ask if Onyx was used, because I've
seen a lot of the folks goingoff off road using that.
I actually use.

Speaker 1 (18:09):
Onyx pretty regularly for finding the park boundaries
of, like the game lands that.
I mentioned before that aresort of remote.
It does a good job of you put a, put your finger down and it
tells you where you're at,basically, or if it.

Speaker 4 (18:21):
Yeah, it definitely pays to spend the time at home
before you leave the house.
You know if you can drive, youknow one or two hours away to
find out what the status is onthe place you plan to activate

(18:46):
else are you doing to sort ofsee like, let's say, planning
your mountain climb or your trek?

Speaker 1 (18:48):
obviously safety becomes sort of a concern as
well, especially formountaineering.
What what is usually yourprocess look like?

Speaker 4 (18:52):
so I'll start with the soatless website.
Um, it's really it's a greatwebsite because it has links to
guy gps that allow you to tolink to cal topo, which is
another mapping software we usequite a bit.
So it talks about, about, youknow, it'll show you those
property issues for one.
But also, where are the roads?
What's the path of leastresistance to the summit?
And I'll spend a decent amountof time, especially if it's an

(19:13):
area where there may not be cellphone coverage, putting out
some of those maps.
You know, kind of bringing someof that stuff with me.
Onyx is another great one, foryou know things like that, and
so I'll.
You know things like that, and,and so I'll.
You know, look at that and kindof okay, this is how I plan to
approach it.
Um, could there be a gate here?
You know, is there any kind ofa seasonal access issue, as
there are sometimes withtimberlands and things like that

(19:34):
?
Um, and then the other part ofthe safety piece is if I'm going
to be out of cell phone rangefor an extended period of time,
having some other kind of like apersonal locating device, like
a garmin in reach or a plb,something like that is really
handy.
I do it just just for peace ofmind for my wife, you know, so I
can tell her checking in everyhour.

(19:54):
So, hey, I'm leaving the truckor I'm, you know, starting my
hike from there.
Um, so I, you know, if I getinjured, encounter, you know,
wildlife, something like thatthere's, there's a breadcrumb
trail, yeah.

Speaker 1 (20:04):
Yeah, perfect, I'm assuming safety is first right.

Speaker 3 (20:07):
Absolutely In any of this, absolutely.
Oh yeah, you want to be able toget down the mountain too.
Yeah, okay.

Speaker 2 (20:13):
I am happy to report to Rory that Brockway Mountain
definitely does qualify.
So, the next time you driveyour Jeep up there, you'll be.
Brockway Mountain at the northend of Michigan is a very
popular spot for folks to driveall the way up and it's a really
cool summit and it would be agreat place to set an antenna up
.
And I had no idea, but itsurprised me at all.

Speaker 5 (20:30):
I would have to get out of the car, though that
would be the hard part, youwouldn't know.

Speaker 1 (20:36):
On the Michigan map.
Where is this, jim?

Speaker 2 (20:39):
Rockway's going to be all the way up by Carver Harbor
, basically Up by the top ofyour upper thumb.
Keep going, keep going, keepgoing.
Further up there you go andit's backwards on my screen it
is backwards.
You get the idea?

Speaker 5 (20:49):
Yeah, so believe it or not.
I mean, it's nothing compared,of course, to the Pacific
Northwest, but when you get tothe western end of the upper
peninsula of Michigan, there isa fair amount of topography up
there.
So the map here does have quitea few spots.
So the map here does have quitea few spots.
And there's another interestingone that I had just zoomed in
on while you were talking aboutthat, jim, and I figured you

(21:10):
were.
Mount Horace, mount Horace,greeley, which is, which is.
I'd have to look at how thatworks with the private property,
because that is technicallyprivate property.
That's the old Air Force baseup there, so but it but it's on
the maps, I don't know.
Can you?
So if it's private property andyou get permission, does that
make it doable?

Speaker 4 (21:29):
Yeah absolutely it does the problem that you run
into.
I'll take an example Aroundhere we have Indian reservations
, and so that's that's somethingyou have to kind of consider.
And not all the, not all thetribes, the reservations have
the same regulations.
They don't have the same.
Some are very exclusive membersonly, some are very broad.

(21:50):
There's another situation whereif there's something that
somebody can get to as abyproduct of work that other
people can't get to, they mayhave an advantage there, and
there are situations wheresomeone's been activated three
times by the same guy onsuccessive years and by nobody
else, because he's an employeeof, you know, whoever owns the
site.
Yep, okay.

Speaker 3 (22:12):
Yeah, and to touch on one more thing from the tools
that Matt mentioned, especiallyin the case where there hasn't
been an activation before andthere's just not a lot of
information Peakbagger, thatwebsite.
There's a whole other communityof information peak bagger,
that website.
There's a whole other communityof people going up to summits
but they're not bringing radios.
I don't know why.
But uh, crazy people.

(22:34):
They will usually write up alittle trip reports or or at
least they'll have like a ticklist so you can see like, okay,
someone was up there a few weeksago or someone went up there
last year about around the sametime.
So you can kind of there'sother tools and reports that you
can dig up and try to get somehints on the best way to get

(22:55):
there.
But we kind of have anunwritten rule in Oregon that if
you're the first to activate asummit you are required to write
a trip report for it.

Speaker 5 (23:03):
Okay, I think that's a good unwritten rule, that's a
good courtesy to build.
I think.

Speaker 2 (23:09):
It builds that community.
I imagine too right you go readthem.
They're exciting for someonethat hasn't or may not ever
activate that particular summit,but you get a little bit of a
story out of that experience,which is excellent, and it
benefits the next guy when heheads up there too yeah.
I think that's one of thedifferentiators right here and
we'll continue to pull these outas we go along with you guys.
So, on Parks on the Air, manyof these can be done with very

(23:32):
little preparation.
In fact, oftentimes we'll throwall of our gear in the car and
it might be in the trunk and wesee a sign that looks like a
national park or a state parkand boom, we swing in and we can
activate.
Right, what I'm hearing fromyou guys is a soda.
Activation is a much moredeliberate maneuver.
Right, there's planning,there's preparation often, and
there is a certain level of Ineed to commit and commit to

(23:55):
this idea of going and executingon this plan.
So it really is cool to seesome parallels, but also some of
these differences that makesoda a more challenging radio
sport as far as that's concerned, but also perhaps, of these
differences that make soda amore challenging radio sport as
far as that's concerned, butalso perhaps more exciting for
some folks that are of that mind.

Speaker 3 (24:12):
Yeah, absolutely.
But you know I don't want toscare anyone away at the same
time, because there's some metroarea summits that you know.
You can drive either all theway up or really close to and
walk up there with your HT andthen make your contacts and just
play a little radio on yourlunch break.

Speaker 2 (24:30):
Nice and it's for contacts, so it is less than you
need for POTA.
So there's anotherdifferentiator there.
It makes a bigger difference,of course, when you're out in
the West, where there's lessradioactivity, perhaps in the
general area.
But yeah, that's a good pointtoo is some of those might be
fairly accessible for the folksaround here in the metros.

Speaker 1 (24:47):
Well, and I think the one thing I've heard too is you
guys have noted you've hadfailed activations and you've
sort of laughed about them.
So I think, in the spirit ofham, get out there and don't be
afraid to try it a little bit,as long as you're prepared, or
find a club, it's going tohappen.

Speaker 3 (25:02):
Yeah, and I'll do a shameless self-promotion here.
On my website, n7komcom, I havesome Summits on the Air,
getting started, instructionsthat I kind of tried to make it
as simple as possible forgetting started and kind of a

(25:24):
checklist to go out for yourfirst activation, without making
it overly complicated.
There's a lot more rules andnuance that you can learn about
later, but this is just forpeople who want to give it a
shot and get out there.

Speaker 1 (25:35):
And, if you're okay, I'll link that in the show notes
.

Speaker 3 (25:38):
Yeah, absolutely.

Speaker 1 (25:39):
Yeah, that sounds fantastic.

Speaker 4 (25:40):
Well, definitely sorry.
I mean, I was definitely.
If you had an opportunity to gowith somebody who's done it
before, I would definitely dothat point and, uh, I, I would
probably do the same thing withparks on the air.
um, you know, just somebodywho's who's actually, you know,
has all the stuff, has all theequipment.
You know, if you can just tagalong and bring minimal gear and
just see it, you know, be ableto get on the air, that's, it's

(26:02):
a really cool thing, it's reallyneat and that kind of emboldens
you to get out and try it onyour own.
So I would definitely recommendthat.

Speaker 2 (26:11):
Matt, does that mean that you have not done POTA
yourself?
I'm sorry if you already saidthat I've done it.

Speaker 4 (26:16):
I've done it a couple of times, and I think it was
before you guys had a, did youguys go through a logging?
Was it in?

Speaker 2 (26:21):
POTA days, like the previous ARRL version of POTA
that they did briefly before itgot A couple years ago.

Speaker 4 (26:29):
Yeah, it must have been.
I had to email some guy with mylogs and say hey, yeah, the
original POTA setup.

Speaker 5 (26:36):
You couldn't.
The database wasn't set up towhere you could log it yourself.
It's come a long way.
I'm laughing If you guys saw melaughing over here.
I found, I found tim's uh storewith stickers and there's a
couple of good ones there, so Iwould, I would, I would
definitely just from my twoseconds scrolling through that,
plug the n7komcom and click onthe scroll down here and click

(26:59):
on the ham radio stickers.
I might, I might have to goshopping tonight.
There's, there's there's some.

Speaker 3 (27:03):
There's some good ones there, for sure just trying
to spread the fun with those,yeah no, those are, those are,
uh, those are excellent.

Speaker 5 (27:10):
I, I, I like that and keep it go ahead, go ahead,
sorry I was just going to sayone more difference between poda
and and soda.

Speaker 3 (27:19):
So with with poda, the hunters don't need to upload
a log to get points.
It's all general.
Their points are generated fromthe activator log.
It works a little different forSoda.
Soda chasers do have to logtheir own activations.
Okay, yeah, or sorry their ownQSOs with the activators so it's

(27:41):
really easy to do from theSodaWatch website, which is
where we post the spots of wherethe frequencies that we're
operating on.
There's a little button youclick, so after you have your
QSO you can just go over there,click that and log it.
So it makes it really simple,but you do have to manually do
it.
It doesn't do it for you.

Speaker 5 (28:01):
I'll have to keep that in mind.
I have not logged as a sodahunter.
Okay, good to know.

Speaker 2 (28:08):
So you would have to take that chase and log it on
the soda site for that person toget there.

Speaker 3 (28:15):
Very good to know.
Sorry, the person the activatorgets points independent of that
.

Speaker 2 (28:23):
The chaser can get points for themselves.
I thought you were going to bepicking up the radio.
They are cross-referenced ofthat.
Oh, okay, okay, but the teasercan get points for themselves.

Speaker 1 (28:27):
I thought you were going to be picking up the radio
and making some contacts.
No, they are cross-referenced.

Speaker 5 (28:30):
Okay, I feel better now.
I was feeling bad there for amoment.

Speaker 2 (28:33):
It was looking guilty there.

Speaker 5 (28:34):
Well, because I'm a perpetual hunter of anything on
the air.
I'll gladly give anyone a cue.
So I'll answer a lot of calls,and I'm happy to have my POTUS
stuff populating my calls and mynumbers go up there
automatically, but maybe I'lllog into the soda thing and get
that going.
I hate to go back to the storehere, though, but there's a mug

(28:55):
that will be purchased.
Don't rag chew with me untilI've had my QSO.

Speaker 1 (29:00):
God, that's made for you, rory, it's made for me.

Speaker 5 (29:03):
Does it say no, go ahead, Rory, it's made for me.

Speaker 3 (29:09):
Does it say no, go ahead?
I'm sort of oriented.
So it says four QSOs.
I could make you a 10 QSO oneif you want that.

Speaker 1 (29:13):
And I need.
I just cross over into a wholenew market.

Speaker 5 (29:15):
I desperately need that and that that's a whole
thing.
Everyone knows that I don't, Idon't screw around until I've
had my, my activation, give thegive the call and move on.
Don't, don't be, don't betalking to me about your
medication and how good theweather is until I'm good.
Yeah, I didn't see that side ofthe mug, but yeah, I might need
that.
Sorry, okay.

Speaker 3 (29:34):
Yeah, hold off for now.
I'll make you up something Idigress I love it.
Oh boy.

Speaker 1 (29:38):
I was going to ask.
You referenced the Soto Watchwebsite.
Is that the main website?

Speaker 3 (29:43):
Yeah, that would be where we post all the spots
where we're operating and whatmode.

Speaker 1 (29:49):
Okay, and I'm assuming if someone's looking
here- Okay, perfect, and I'massuming if someone's looking to
get started, they should gothere.

Speaker 4 (29:55):
create an account do all that stuff as well, yeah,
okay, yeah, I don't use that toomuch because I usually do it
via the app, so there's aSodaGoat app.

Speaker 3 (30:09):
Oh.

Speaker 4 (30:09):
I'm going to try it out.
Soda has so many cool websitesand applications, but somebody
came up with a SodaGoat app thatallows you to actually post
spots or see where otherpeople's spots are, so kind of
like.
Parks on the Air similar If Iwas looking to do a park-to-park
, I could go onto the Parks onthe air.
Similar if I was looking to doa park to park, I could go onto
the parks in their website andsee where somebody is on this

(30:30):
frequency and go to theirfrequency and get a park to park
with them.
Same same principle withsummits on their summit to
summit, s2s, uh, contacts, morepoints.
So I get the points from theiractivation.
So it's it's a separate kind ofpoints, it's a summit to summit
exclusive point, but it they'rereally neat, they're kind of
fun to do.
So, yeah, there there are waysto so anyway, to kind of go back

(30:50):
to post a spot, that'd be oneway to do it.
Oh, the other thing we have, Ithink is similar to poda, is you
guys have rbn.
Um, if I post an alert, rbnwill pick it up.
So for cw we do.

Speaker 1 (31:01):
We have.
We have a couple apps that willdo that for us.
I was gonna ask how, whenyou're on the mountain, do you
spot yourselves?
I'm assuming you maybepre-schedule your activation as
one method, but we do.
Yeah, I think we actuallyalmost use the same app.

Speaker 5 (31:16):
But yeah, the RVN, the Reverse Beacon Network, does
pick up the soda Soda.

Speaker 1 (31:22):
Mat, which is probably an app you may be
familiar with.
I've used that before to usethe RVBN to spot myself in a
park out in Colorado actually,where I didn't have a lot of
cellular coverage while doing apark activation.

Speaker 4 (31:35):
You can also do it via APRS, which I've done, and
there's a way to do it via theinReach.
If you send an inReach messageto a specific number, it'll do
that as well.

Speaker 3 (31:42):
And text message also .
I use that a lot where maybeI'm out somewhere and I don't
have data, but I have regularcellular messaging and then you
can send a text message and getspotted.
Yep, yeah, that makes sense.

Speaker 2 (31:58):
So I'm a little bit curious so to matt.

Speaker 3 (32:01):
Of course you can use that to send ft8 yep.
Well, if you have a radio thatwill hook up to your phone, or
SSB, where you just hold downthe mic manually.
It'll send that FT8 andactually post a spot for you.

Speaker 1 (32:15):
Yeah, that's a fair point, because I'm mainly an SSB
operator.
So yeah, I remember sittingthere and holding the phone and
then some lady was looking at meabout why was I playing weird
beeps and boops?
Into this, this microphonesitting at a picnic table, but
you know you do what you got todo.
Yeah, it's a.
It's a great method.

Speaker 2 (32:33):
All right, gentlemen.
So soda takes us on some prettysweet adventures.
Obviously, we're hearing moreof that the further we peel the
onion here.
Tell us I'd love to hear onefrom each of you guys Talk about
one of your favorite ones thatyou went out, why it was, you
know what made it a challenge,why you loved that particular
one, why it sticks in your head.
I'd love to hear maybe mattfirst and then tim, give us one

(32:53):
that you really enjoyed goingout and doing, and and tell us a
little why uh, I would have tosay it's probably my.

Speaker 4 (32:59):
My mountain goat activation here in january this
year went out with my.
The same guy introduced me tosummits on the air.
Uh went and snowshoed up mountspokane, which is an active ski
resort on one side but allowspeople to snowshoot at the top.
Get up there to the activation,so it was a little bit cold.
We're on kind of the westernslope.
Uh, there was some wind chill.
Uh kind of thing when you'retrying to do cw.

(33:20):
Uh, without with gloves itwon't do cw, you know, kind of
right.
So you kind of lose tactile feeland people can get frustrated
with your really bad code aftera while.
Anyway, it was a blast, it wasa lot of fun.
It took me almost five years toget Mountain Goat.
It was a journey, it's been ablast and it was kind of the

(33:41):
culmination of all of thatexperience and learning and
building and everything thatgoes with it.
It was just, it was really neat.

Speaker 2 (33:49):
it was an awesome experience I got two questions
for you.
Tell us what it takes to be amountain goat?
Uh, because I don't think weknow yet.
And then also, I'd love to knowhow long it took you to get
there on snowshoes so mountaingoat is a thousand activator
points.

Speaker 4 (34:04):
There's also a trophy for Shacksloft, which is the
reverse.
For the chasers it's a thousandchaser points.
And so let's go back to step.
Different summits have adifferent point value.
So the smallest summits in myarea are two points.
There are summits that are evendown to one point.
It's based on elevation, not howlong it takes you to get there,

(34:27):
not how many miles, not howmany, it's just purely based on
elevation.
Um, and it goes all the way upthere, actually 10 point summits
.
And then there are summerbonuses and winter bonuses in
different regions.
So we have a winter bonus herethat goes from december 1st
through march 31st, um in thew7w region.
I I think Oregon's probably thesame and then places like

(34:48):
Arizona have a summer bonus.
So that'll take a 10-pointsummit and make it a 13-point
summit so you can get toMountain Goat faster by, you
know, trying to activate inthose peak seasons.
So yeah, once you get thosefour QSOs, you go home and log
it and you get the points andyou can pretty quickly in places
like Arizona and some otherplaces, you can get to mountain

(35:09):
goat very quickly.
It took a while.
Like I said, I think it tookabout four and a half years here
.

Speaker 3 (35:14):
Yeah, it took me four years.
Yeah, okay, takes a while, yeah, and then the snowshoe was
short.

Speaker 4 (35:20):
Snowshoe was like I don't know, think it was two
miles, so it was I don't know 15, 20, 30 minutes, something like
that.

Speaker 1 (35:26):
Only two miles up the side of a mountain, but you
know.

Speaker 2 (35:29):
Are we talking about traditional, like big net
snowshoes?
Are we talking about the newones that are just like a vinyl
plank with the pivot and thewhole nine yards, real high tech
ones?

Speaker 4 (35:38):
Closer to the second one yeah, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 2 (35:41):
yeah, some of the newer style.
I've used both up here inGaylord, which used to get quite
a bit of snow.
Michigan doesn't quite see thesame snowfall as it used to.
In the midnight we used tosnowshoe quite a bit.
So I'm always curious whenpeople say I snowshoed out there
, how long did that take you?
If you have the right gear,probably less time, but very
cool.
And I do want to call it outbecause Matt pointed out

(36:01):
something that I didn't quiteunderstand and it sort of just
clicked now.
On mont spokane, for example,it is six points generally, but
you add a plus three during theharder months, which is the
december through.
What is december through march?
That matt?

Speaker 4 (36:16):
mentions, there's even that turns into a nine
point summit there's even atradition that has kind of
caught on here in the northwestwhere guys would go out on
december 1st and it's based onzulu day.
So they'll go out, make surethey get the contacts for the
points before midnight z andthen wait around for 15, 20
minutes.
So the same guys will call youagain right away and go hey, I
want you know.

(36:36):
So that's your double points.
Yeah, it's awesome.

Speaker 3 (36:38):
That brings up a a good point about the points in
summits on the air, this rulethat we didn't cover.
So you can, you can activate asummit as many times as you want
in a given year, but you onlyget points for the first time
you do it.
Oh so, if I like my localsummit here.
I've already activated lavabutte.

(36:59):
I can go up there again playradio, have a lot of fun, but I
won't get any more points for ituntil that UTC rollover in
January.

Speaker 2 (37:09):
Okay, so it's a full year that those points are
applied for.

Speaker 5 (37:14):
Wow, that makes it make a lot more sense that it
took four years for you guys toget to that.
I'm still looking at this sillymap.
I'm so distracted.
This is all new to me, and whenI find something new, I'm
always looking like a crazyperson.
Distracted.
This is all new to me, and whenI find something new, I'm
always looking like a crazyperson.
So we and mount mount arvon, upoutside of lance, up in the up,
there is an eight pointer, withthree more in the winter.
So that that's not bad.
Yeah, that's not bad, thatone's.

(37:36):
I know someone who lives nearthere.
I wonder if she knows aboutsoda.
She's a ham too.
She lives actually just downthe side of that mountain.
So I might I might have to sendher a message.

Speaker 2 (37:46):
I have one last question for Matt on his
adventure out there.
Matt, is this one that you didsolo or did you take a buddy on
this?
I?

Speaker 4 (37:52):
took a buddy, then MCB his name's also Matt, he was
.
He was in the military with me.
We flew together, so he was theguy that got me into Soto, went
out there and did it.
Yeah, it was cool, I think he'she's been on quite a few of the
soda activations here with me.
So yeah, it's a good time.
It's.
It's always more fun withsomebody else and in fact he
actually recorded.
I get a little video that'spretty neat, oh you'll have to

(38:14):
share it with us if you don'tmind.

Speaker 2 (38:16):
Yeah, that'd be cool if you send it to james, maybe
we can get it cut in here.
Okay, we still have some timethere.
We go the power of editing.
There we go that that'sinteresting.

Speaker 5 (38:24):
That's something else I noticed.
Like the three of us tend to dopoda solo, we tend to prefer to
poda solo, but I could seewhere soda, you would
necessarily want to do that.
In some cases and in most cases, I think, some of the more
difficult ones you might want tohave someone along, or just to
make it a little more fun, or,in your case, to take some video
on, or, in your case, to takesome video.

(38:49):
But, uh, what which do youprefer?
Some, some solo trips or ortrips with friends, or which or
they both have their pluses andminuses, I'd imagine they both
have their pluses and minuses.

Speaker 4 (38:54):
Um, yeah, I uh definitely the solitude, uh
around here is is great to beable to get out there in a
weekday and everybody else is atwork and find them out that
nobody's nobody's activatedbefore, and be up there for an
hour, an hour, and yeah, andwhen you're out with a couple
other people, there's a fewdifferent strategies to operate.

Speaker 3 (39:18):
You can all kind of spread out in the activation
zone and just sort of hey, I'mon 40 meters, All right, I'm on
20.
And just sort of, you know,switch bands try not to
interfere too bad with eachother.
Or you can just set up oneradio, one antenna and swap off,
and I think that's my favoriteway to go, especially because
you're both right there.

(39:39):
So if there's asummit-to-summit calling, you
can call AS, as, as well onMorse code, which means standby,
and then your buddy can get thesame summit-to-summit right
there and you know, if you'redoing SSB, standby for one more
operator and just pass themicrophone around.
And that's a lot of fun, verycool Tim tell me about yours.

(40:02):
Yeah, I could A few come to mind.
I think I'll mirror Matt hereand say the mountain goat
activation, because it was atthe Oregon Summits on the Air
campout and we started hiking, Ithink at 4 am, to get up Mount
McLaughlin in southern Oregon.
We have a lot of volcanoes inOregon so this is going to be a

(40:24):
theme in this.
But we had a few differentoperators up there and it was
just a blast to do one of thoseearly morning sunrise hikes up a
big mountain and then work aton of people at the camp out on
two meters fm, two meters cw,and then we were doing 10 meters
and and a few other bands aswell.

(40:46):
And the surprise for me was onmy fourth contact where I got
the points and and got over thethe goat threshold.
Uh, nathan n7, nwt busted outsome some tory like goat ears
and popped them on my head, earsand horns, so I wore that.
For the rest of the activationwas a lot of fun nice.

Speaker 2 (41:07):
I always appreciate the hams getting together and
kind of all being nerds togetherand enjoying it together,
because it's hard to it's hardto have somebody that's not
doing this thing that we callradio sport, uh, to understand
why it is important to us right,and why it is so cool for us
when those types of thingshappen.
So it is, it's fun to besurrounded by folks that
understand a little bit.

(41:28):
So, yeah, activation there.

Speaker 3 (41:30):
Another one was from this year and kind of
shenanigans is is the of thecamp out, like we were doing 70
centimeter SSTV, two meter CW,just like if you have a Quan
Chang.
You know we were doing a lot ofstuff with those.
But Adam K6ARK, who youprobably know that name, he
brought his VibroBlex bug up ona first activation climb Uh, so

(41:55):
there's three of us up there andhe was doing two meters CW with
a vibroplex.

Speaker 1 (42:00):
And that's cool, yeah .
So I have one question too,which is more personal related,
but you both being newer hams asmuch as myself.
I wanted to try to makelearning CW sort of a thing for
me this winter, because I'mgoing to be stuck inside a
little bit.
How did you guys learn CW soquickly?
What tools did you use?

(42:20):
I'm going to detour a littleoff soda for a second.

Speaker 4 (42:23):
I think I've run the gamut.
I started with LCWO, learn CWOnline, which has a bunch of
drills.
There are quite a few websitesthat'll let us up drills or
activators or chasers, callsigns for you to catch.
The issue I ran into with thatpretty quickly is there's not a
lot of.
There's not a lot else otherthan just the RST exchange and
the call sign.

(42:43):
It's pretty limited, it's kindof scripted.
So there's a website calledVBAND.
If you guys are familiar, hamRadio Solutions has a website
that allows you to go on with akey and a little adapter that
they sell and go on there andactually have CWQs.
And you know for my situation,without an actual ham shack here
at the house, that works outgreat and actually take it on

(43:05):
business trips.
I have a little adapter in mybag and just sit there in the
hotel room and can have you knowQSOs with people anywhere in
the world over the internet andjust practice that you know
learning and send uh, listeningand sending.
So that was probably the onethat those kind of the uh
recently has been the catalystand has helped me get, get
better.
Okay.

Speaker 2 (43:24):
Yeah, that is very interesting.
I've just looked that up and,uh, the little USB dongle to uh
allow for practice that waySeems very smart.
Uh, it does.
I will ask this question.
I do have a straight key nextto me.
What?
What do you guys use?
Is it straight, or do you usethe?

Speaker 5 (43:38):
what's your?

Speaker 2 (43:38):
preference here, I use a paddle, do you?
Yeah, okay, paddle, paddle, forsure.

Speaker 3 (43:43):
Yeah, you're, you're nodding, yeah, so I use a paddle
, but I'm learning straight keyand this was a project that I
wrapped up last weekend.
But I got a navy flame proofkey.
I don't know if you're familiarwith those but, not, but if you
have it, you okay, yep, yep.
But okay.
I didn't like the black.

(44:03):
It was kind of boring, so Iwent all Jackson Pollock on it
and uh did a did a cool paintjob.

Speaker 2 (44:10):
It is very I would almost call it like an 80s style
splatter paint kind of.

Speaker 3 (44:15):
Thing.

Speaker 2 (44:15):
Yellow base and then blacks and blue.
Did I see pink in there?

Speaker 3 (44:18):
Yeah, we got pink, blue, some real dark navy purple
kind of Very cool yeah.

Speaker 2 (44:28):
So fun with my stuff, turned it up on the straight
key and I love it.
Anything to make it fun, rightguys?
Yeah?

Speaker 5 (44:37):
I think, jim, you've struggled to bang away at the
straight key there.
You, you don't, you don't do soI think.
I think you got to get a paddlein there.
I think you'd be better I, I do.

Speaker 2 (44:43):
I do need to get one.
I uh ended up buying the uhzygu, a straight key, and and
it's, it's a nice key, uh, asfar as that's concerned, but I
didn't know what I wanted and Ithought that that might be a
little simpler to start on.
I don't know if I made theright call.
It doesn't matter.
I like getting equipment, so Imight have to get something more
.

Speaker 3 (44:59):
So what really helped me?
I started with that samewebsite that Matt talked about,
and the drills on that weren'treally taken for me Okay, and
what I found really helped wasjoining.
What I ended up doing was CWOps has a free course.

Speaker 1 (45:16):
I've seen that one too.

Speaker 3 (45:19):
They put you in a cohort with, like I don't know,
four or five other people andyou meet twice a week and just
having the peer pressure thataccountability.
I don't want to fall behind myclassmates.
My classmates Really helped alot just for making sure I was

(45:41):
practicing every single day andworking on that instant
character recognition.

Speaker 1 (45:42):
In the effort of trying to practice, I did buy a
CWMorrisus pedal key.

Speaker 2 (45:47):
Everybody's showing their keys off.
Everybody's showing their keysoff.

Speaker 1 (45:50):
I feel bad, like a bad ham.
I see it sitting here in frontof me all the time and I keep
telling myself I need to learn,I need to learn.

Speaker 2 (45:56):
I need to get this out and use it.

Speaker 1 (45:58):
Well, I mean, you know you bought it and my wife's
going to start asking questionsabout why have you never used
that?

Speaker 2 (46:02):
thing that you bought .

Speaker 1 (46:04):
So you know, better late than never, I suppose.

Speaker 4 (46:06):
This is a good example of a soda key.
So this is the K6ARK 3D printedone.
And I was hanging out at abuddy's house yesterday we had a
little assembly line going.
I think we cranked out six oreight in an hour and just having
a soldering station I mean thisthing weighs.
I don't know.
Tim probably knows what itweighs Nothing.

Speaker 2 (46:22):
Nothing Like two ounces max, not even.

Speaker 4 (46:25):
So this is great because you know, if I 3D print
this thing and solder it and allof a sudden it Well, I was
going to ask how much equipment?

Speaker 1 (46:35):
are you worried about not having backup or redundancy
?
I'm assuming you take backupkeys like you said.
Yeah, I take a couple ofantennas.

Speaker 4 (46:43):
I take a couple of batteries, because everything's
so small I usually take just oneprimary radio, but a couple of
paddles, a couple of antennas, acouple of batteries still
weighs a lot and I'm assuming wedidn't even talk about antennas
.

Speaker 1 (46:54):
really, I'm assuming you're using wire antennas
mainly, probably on some sort oflightweight mast.

Speaker 4 (46:58):
Mostly, yeah, nfeds and maybe some dipoles.
Yeah, I think most guys areusing NFEDs or dipoles of some
kind.

Speaker 3 (47:07):
Yeah, I'm using NFED Halfwave with my MTR Actually,
so what I've been showing at thescreen is my entire kit,
including battery.
So in this thing is also my, myentire antenna.

Speaker 2 (47:20):
It's a trapped and fed half wave oh, okay and then
with him showing us a uh, alittle nylon case.
It's very small.
You could probably stick it inthe back pocket of a large pair
of jeans, yeah, and uh, on my,on my kx2, I use a nfed random
wire.

Speaker 3 (47:38):
Okay, okay but it's still a very, very lightweight
antenna and but gives you lotsof all the bands.
Gives you all the bands kx2 hasbuilt-in tuner.

Speaker 2 (47:48):
Yeah, I'm trying.

Speaker 1 (47:49):
Yeah, yeah, okay, yeah, not familiar with that
hardware, but uh, yep okay andthe kx2 has a built-in battery
too, right, right, am I makingthat up Well?

Speaker 3 (47:56):
you can unplug it.
I take it out to charge it.
But yeah, it's all containedwithin the case, Okay.

Speaker 2 (48:02):
Does anybody have I have to ask this question
because I just find it to beextremely novel Elecraft's KH1.
Does anybody have one of those?

Speaker 1 (48:09):
Matt's got it down in his lap he's ready to show.

Speaker 2 (48:11):
Okay, very cool radio .
Every time I see somebodyrunning one of those, I'm always
very impressed.

Speaker 1 (48:15):
Yeah, I'm a little bit jealous.
Yeah, I got one of those too.

Speaker 2 (48:20):
Nice, Matt.
Matt, you're muted.
Go ahead and unmute.
Let us know what you had there.

Speaker 4 (48:24):
Sorry about that.
Yeah, I was going to say forbusiness trips.
This thing is money because injust about any piece of luggage
right and take it with you.

Speaker 2 (48:38):
And not many questions until you get there,
and then you're dragging alittle counterpoise wire behind
you while you're walking alongascended CW.
Yeah, and we have a gentlemanthat runs one of those in the
local park here in the SouthLion area.
His name is Ram and he walksaround with his motorcycle suit
on he motorcycles so he usesthat as his light kit and he

(49:00):
does CW while he's walkingaround the park with a little
telescoping antenna.
So I'm always entertained whenI see him activating.

Speaker 5 (49:06):
I have never seen him there.
For as many times as I've heardof people running into him
there, I've never seen him outthere, and I've been in the park
the same time as he has beforetoo.

Speaker 2 (49:14):
K-E-8-U-E-X, I believe, is his call sign.
Sounds right you always see him.

Speaker 1 (49:19):
So I guess we're running out of time here.
I want to give Matt and Tim onelast chance.
Is there anything about Soda?
If you're going to talk to thethree of us to get us motivated
to get out there and climb somemountains, what would you say?

Speaker 4 (49:29):
The one thing I would just leave you with is don't
let the getting outdoors andgetting up on a mountain be a
discriminator.
There are drive-up summits.
There are really easy summitsout there, there are urban
summits you can go do, and evenif all of those are not in the
range of possibilities, based onyour location, chasing is also

(49:50):
huge.
I mean, there is no sodawithout chasers, so we
absolutely need those chasers.
It's a lot of fun.
It's just a blast to be able totalk to somebody on a little
five-watt radio via CW.
Multiple states away, we get toFrance.
Tim will tell you about France.
We get France almost on a dailybasis.
We get Japan pretty regularly.
We get some other countries.
It's a blast.

(50:12):
It is really neat to be able tocommunicate with somebody like
that.
It is just, it is really neatto be able to communicate with
somebody like that.

Speaker 3 (50:18):
And, uh, I would.
I would recommend it foranybody, absolutely.
Yeah, I would really just echoMatt.
And, uh, you know we postvideos to YouTube of these like
epic summits, where we're hikingall night and climbing up
mountains, but that's notrepresentative of the entire
sport.
So you can do these drive upand easy ones and, you know, I
recommend connecting withsomeone to take you out for for
your first time if you can.

Speaker 2 (50:40):
Awesome, okay.
Well, I want to thank Matt fortaking some time.
He actually emailed us justabout two weeks ago now and he
said hey, I know, I know youguys don't don't do a much soda
over that way, but there's alarge population of hams on the
West coast that enjoy doing sodaand we of hams on the west
coast that enjoy doing soda andwe'd love to love to chat with
you about it, and so I want toappreciate, appreciate, matt,

(51:00):
for uh reaching out to us andsuggesting it and putting it on
our radar right, becausecomparing these two very
prevalent radio sports justbecause the geographies are
different here, uh has beenreally fun to hear kind of why
folks are doing it, how to do it, and uh try to get get us
motivated.
I think that it's probablylikely that all three of us will
have to go out and activate asummit the next time we're up
north.

Speaker 1 (51:21):
Or we'll send you.
Yeah, we'll let you know whenwe're here now.

Speaker 3 (51:23):
For sure I'll get y'all's call sign and my ham
alert, so I'll be looking foryou.

Speaker 1 (51:28):
Watch out, and I can also say Matt, thank you also
for my side, because I wasexcited to get that email and I
remember emailing Jim and Rorylike, hey, guys want to talk
about soda.
It sounds pretty exciting andit's something I have no
experience in.
And then you were like I'mgoing to also try to bring a
friend.

Speaker 4 (51:41):
I was like, all right , let's do this so thank you
also, tim for joining Matt fortaking the time, absolutely.

Speaker 1 (51:50):
Thanks, tim.
Thank you, and so, tim, we'llmake sure to link your website
as well.
Thank you, matt, I'm not sure.
Is there anywhere people we canlink for you?

Speaker 4 (51:57):
that people maybe learn more about you.
My TRZ page.
I don't really have one, butPut him in your ham alert.

Speaker 2 (52:03):
Put him in your ham alert.
There you go, Tim.
That is the right approach.

Speaker 1 (52:06):
That's where he'll appreciate you the most.

Speaker 4 (52:07):
Definitely.

Speaker 1 (52:09):
So with that last plug for the Everyday Ham as
well, you can go toeverydayhamcom, learn about our
socials, our links to YouTube,our audio links for the podcast,
like and subscribe as always,and with that, everyone.
73.
Thank you, thank you, guys.
73.

Speaker 3 (52:24):
Ham smarter.