w6csn’s outdoor amateur radio

Having many POTA-able parks close to home is great. Not all activators have it so easy. That said, I find myself traveling further afield to find new parks to activate.

Half Moon Bay State Beach (K-3439) is about a 45 minute drive south via Highway 35 then along coastal Highway 1. The Venice Boulevard access road is a non-descript right turn just past Frenchman’s Creek.

There is plenty of parking and lots of picnic tables to choose from. However there’s not much in the way of antenna or mast supports. So for this activation I set up the Gabil tripod and adjustable coil right on the picnic table with the MFJ 10 foot whip as the radiator.

Only one slight coil adjustment was needed to get a perfect match on 20 meters and the CW portion of the band was alive with signals, always a good sign.

With solid cell service here, self spotting was easy on pota.app. I had the FT-818 all ready to go and was off to the races. With 40 minutes of operating time I found 13 hunters for this QRP activation.

QSOs were logged from across the USA and into Canada. The long distance winner was K1BZ from Augusta, Maine. Thanks to all the hunters that made this activation a success.

73 de W6CSN