w6csn’s outdoor amateur radio

This trip across Utah was on the return leg of our western states road trip that took us as far east as Colorado. Our first time in Utah, several days earlier, followed a route further north in the Logan area through the Cache Valley.

On this return leg, we spent the night in Salt Lake City and got started driving again around mid-morning. Back on I-80, we spotted the sign for Great Salt Lake State Park (US-3075) and my XYL requested we stop and have a look.

I already had Utah in the bag with my earlier activation of Bud Phelps WMA in Logan and didn’t really intend to collect another park in the state. But we’d paid the park entrance fee and it seemed silly to not at least attempt an activation. When am I going to be back at the Great Salt Lake?

After looking around a bit at the lake, which we found to be generally underwhelming, I grabbed the KH1 and setup up on a picnic table with a Tufteln right-angle adapter holding up the 4 foot whip. The counterpoise was simply tossed out toward the lake.

With deteriorating propagation conditions and a very short antenna, it took more than an hour to gather up the 10 QSOs needed for a complete activation. The last several contacts came from hunting other POTA/SOTA ops.

With the activation complete and the discomfort of the hot weather around the lake, we hopped back into the air conditioned car to continue our westward journey home.

73 de W6CSN