SOTA

Hey-hey friends, welcome back. Last couple of months have been hectic - Russia as you probably know invades Ukraine and I have quite a lot of family there under russian bombs. Alfred Thayer Mahan once said “The true speed of war is not headlong precipitancy, but the unremitting energy which wastes no time.” So I am trying to do my best keeping calm, carrying on and staying frosty.

In line with staying frosty I decided to activate one the easier ten pointers in Sierra Nevada before snow melts and winter activation bonus expires in April.

Hello friends, this is the winter SOTA activation report for Genoa Peak aka W7N/TR-007 on the Nevada side of lake Tahoe.

This is my first winter activation qualifying for bonus points and the first outside the W6 SOTA region (California). Last winter I tried to activate Mt. Tallac on the other side of Tahoe lake and didn’t make it to the summit. This time I chose a less ambitious goal of Genoa peak towering to the west from Genoa, NV on the eastern shore of lake Tahoe.

Hello and welcome back! As I wrote in my previous post, I need one more activator point to reach my goal of 100 points by the end of 2021.

I wanted this one to be fairly simple and fast so the mountain today is Maguire peak aka W6/NC-516 located in the Sunol wilderness - the backyard of Silicon Valley.

Besides the SOTA activation I wanted to visit one the first European permanent settlements in the Bay Area - Mission San Jose in Fremont, CA, about a fifteen minute drive from the trail head.

Hi there! As I had already mentioned one of the cool aspects of SOTA is that it gamifies hiking. I do think being outdoors is cool enough on its own but knowing myself I would just stay in my cozy comfort zone with a mug of hot chocolate in my hands and repeat the same hikes over and over again. Luckily each SOTA activation only yields points once per a calendar year so there is always an incentive to activate new summits. My goal this year is reaching the first milestone on the path toward the coveted ‘Mountain Goat’ status - getting 100 points activating on CW.

It is November already and I must hurry - higher mountains already have their first snow this season and I expect and hope for more soon-ish. This means activating higher value summits now until snow makes it more difficult or activating frequently which is not really an option because on top of a need to hold a paying job I am lazy as hell.

Welcome back! In my previous post I promised to test my new TR-25 in the field. Lo and behold Mount Konocti aka W6/CC-035 activation report!

I wanted to provide chasers with something juicier than one point summits around the Bay Area but at the same time didn’t want to go all in with a new transceiver. On top of that a friend was joining me for the hike which meant I needed to haul some additional food and water. Add a backup rig and you have yourself quite a hefty backpack.