Lake Orange State Fishing Lake K-4983

My first activation, the closest park to home. It was a perfect day, not too windy, not too cold. I learned some things about setting up efficiently:

• My trusty Chameleon EMCOMM-II antenna that worked so well for NVIS in my back yard was not ideal for POTA (too heavy).
• I apparently thought pixies were going to support one end of the antenna, because I didn’t bring anything. I ended up finding a nail in the eaves of the pavilion left over from Christmas lights or something like that.
• Too many cables! I brought everything I thought I might need, and ended up spending a lot of time untangling cables. Next time, fewer cables and more Velcro ties.
• Visibility is your friend. I looked up and saw someone about to hang himself on my sloper, even though I had installed it in a location that I thought was out of the way. Switched to orange paracord and added some orange streamers.

Still, the activation was successful and I was hooked! I’m a digital modes operator, which makes me a POTA Rare Bird (only about 4% of activators have over 1000 digital contacts).