Redwood Park at 40

I have been returning to Redwood Park repeatedly where I operate my ham radio in the Parks on the Air Program (POTA). Today marks the 40th activation and the next level in the program. I have now achieved the Fox Den award in this park. It is not my first time at this level, I actually made to the next level at Cambell Valley Park, but now that Redwood is on the list, it is much faster to get to and actually has a nicer set up for my needs. This week-end also coincides with the quarterly Support-Your-Parks weekend where one gets additional awards for participating in the seasonal event. Add to this adventure was the success in my previous trip of achieving the kilo award which is given when you have completed 1000 radio contacts from the park. It has been a good few days.

The morning was dry but only 2C so it was a cool start but the sun was out and the day would be warming quickly. Once the dogs had their morning walk, I loaded the car and drove the two miles to the park. It wasn’t busy yet with only a few cars parked, mostly for people walking their dogs. I parked and loaded my cart with my equipment and set out for the lower covered picnic area. I do prefer the upper one but the ground next to it is very wet and muddy with all the rain and not a nice spot to set up in. The lower area is much drier.

I raised my antenna in quick order which caught the eye of a passing family, their pre-schooler was quite interested in my actions. I answered the father’s questions and gave him one of my trifold brochures. He seemed quite interested and asked about courses to get licensed.  I then proceeded to set up the radio and scan across the bands. I tried to hear fellow club member Jim who was activating Kwomais Point Park but I couldn’t hear him. Being the quarterly event week-end there were many more than normal park activators busy out there today. I saw almost 200 on the list and since I prefer the higher bands,  I dialed in the 10m band and started scanning. I could hear a couple operators mixed in amongst other hams who were busy doing other contests. I then scanned the 12m and 15m bands which gave me 5 park-to-park contacts. I returned to 10m and selected a frequency and began my own calling. 

My first response was from a station in Ohio then Jim found me and we completed five park-to-park contacts across 5 bands, Bob also found the two of us and we completed a few more multi-band contacts. Done with the locals I returned to my 10m frequency and continued calling. It was a slow go but I did manage a few more contacts including one from a station in Brazil. A number of other park activators came by giving me some more P2P’s. Then I finished calling and did a bit of hunting other activators, finishing with 23 contacts in the log.

By now the sun had warmed the area enough that the early mists were gone and the air was not so bitter. It made for a nice invitation to take a walk through the park with my camera. I packed up my station and stowed it in my car and then set out to view other areas of the park. I wandered back past where I had operated continuing into the woods and stopped to take a few photos of the scenery. I tried a few different angles of the famous treehouse whose historical value was the reason the park is on the POTA list. The roof is rotting in one area and likely needs some attention before the interior gets wet. I then continued along the trail to the fairy village. Unfortunately, the fairies had gone south for the winter and there were only a couple of houses to be found. I thought that they might have gotten damaged in the windstorms but there were not enough broken pieces to account for them all. Rumours suggest that either the parks people clear them out periodically to make room for more or that well-wishers collect them for the winter and bring them back come spring. I do hope it is the latter as some of those homes were quite pretty and took a lot of work to make. Disappointed in not catching up with the fairies I continued my walk along the trails back to my car. I did pass by the upper tables and sure enough the ground was very soggy. Done with my operating and stroll through the park I returned to my car and set out on the short drive back home.

It had been a very good day operating and enjoying some fresh air in the park. I chatted with people from Florida to California and down to Brazil. I even managed to have time with my friends from our radio club. Now I can start on the next set of twenty visits and earn the next award.