Trip Report from Dual Base Op - Cuddeback

The Cuddeback team (Greg K6GHL, Candy KC6ROX and Jeff N6JSV) arrived mid morning on Friday.  We were greeted at the turnoff from Hwy 395 by Fernando (KJ6YOS).  He was headed up to somewhere around Death Valley to look for lost treasure.  Shortly after arrival at basecamp location we were joined by Jim (KJ7A) and Blackjack.  Setting up camp was a little challenging due to 10-15 knot winds.  After we had setup camp and a net control station Jeff and Greg set off to place the caches.  Jim and Candy stayed back at camp to monitor the radio.  While setting caches Christian (KM6NVI) and Land Ops newest ham Karen (KM6WBM) arrived at basecamp.  I want to give a shout out to Karen for passing  both her Technician and General tests in less than a month as well as Christen for upgrading to General.  Karen is a natural on the radio.  A 75 meter voice QSO was successfully completed between Rick (W8KO) in Broadwell basecamp, Tim (AG6RS) in Long Beach and Greg at Cuddeback.  As a backup we were also able to communicate using the 2 meter Big Bear (K6BB) repeater.  All contacts were clear and it was a good start to our Dual Base Op.   The six of us had a nice evening sheltered from the wind that had subsided.  

Saturday welcomed us with sunny skies and little wind.  Kenny (KJ6FWG) joined us for the op.  We successfully performed a test of our 80 meter Contestia digital setup.  Rick, Tim and I were all able to communicate without any issues.  We decided that we did not need any additional testing and were ready for the op.  We started the op early because both teams were itching to get going.  The Cuddeback team consisted of Jim and Greg at net control.  Jeff was Charlie team overwatch, Christian & Karen (Charlie Team Leads), Candy and Kenny.  We had excellent HF digital comms between Broadwell and Cuddeback net control as well as 2 meter comms within the team.  The op was completed as planned with everyone having a good time. We didn’t even have to resort to our back-up means of communication (BB repeater, text and phone)…amazing.  Kenny was not able to stay the night due to other priorities.  We had another nice evening chatting about the day, suggestions for future trips and just whatever came to mind.

Mother nature decided that we needed a lot of wind to make the trip interesting.  Most of the night and the morning we had winds blowing at 20+ knots.  The blustery morning moved everybody to pack up as quickly as possible and head for home.  I want to thank Jeff and Jim for  helping me pack up the net control station as well as all the other stuff that I bring. By 9:30 we were all on the road with memories of another fun weekend with the Land Ops team.

A special shout out to Rick and Tim for all of their countless hours over the past year testing and coming up with a plan for what frequency and what mode is needed to execute a HF communication between 2 remote off the grid base station.  Bravo Zulu (well done)!  

Great event everyone!  We had great Hf digital communications between both bases.  Great weather and no major vehicle issues made for a great Op.  Thanks to all who made the event and hope to see you on the trail again soon!

Jim

Matt Lovell wrote:

Due to an unfortunate chain of events, I am not going to be able to make this Op :(

Due to an unfortunate chain of events, I am not going to be able to make this Op :(

Christian Judge wrote:

Christian Judge wrote:

Cuddeback

My wife Karen, now KM6WBM, will be coming along as well, by the way. Looking forward to it!